Publication

Around 3.3% of Scotland’s population (182,516 people) are served by private water supplies (PWS) together with transient visitors such as tourists. This project sought to develop an understanding of the epidemiology and disease burden contribution of PWS in Scotland on the public health of the populations (indigenous and transient) exposed to the PWS. The project report comprises a risk profile to provide current knowledge about the risks of gastrointestinal pathogens associated with private water supplies in Scotland. This is supplemented with preliminary work looking at the linkage of human gastrointestinal illness with private water supply microbiological failures and the scoping out of a quantitative microbiological risk assessment approach for PWS in Scotland.