DHH reports traces of brain-eating amoeba in St. Bernard Parish water system

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DHH reports traces of brain-eating amoeba in St. Bernard Parish water system

A brain eating amoeba has, once again, been found in the St. Bernard Parish water system.

The Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals confirmed the potentially deadly parasite Wednesday night after tests.

DHH started conducting these tests after the same type of amoeba was detected in the St. Bernard Parish's water supply in 2013. A 4-year-old boy was infected and died. 

a reply to: fshrrex

Peralta and I obviously have a very different understanding of the term "safe to drink".

When I think about the term "safe to drink" I think about pH balance, microbial content, mineral content, and whether these things are within acceptable tolerances. That is to say, if there is a one in sixteen trillion chance that drinking the water is going to give me even a mild stomach ache, I am not going to drink it unless dying of thirst is the only alternative. More to the point, asking people to pay to have water run to their home, means that one has to provide water that is NEVER contaminated, by any thing, for any damned reason. If your pipes can be destroyed, cracked, split, punctured, or otherwise compromised, then the chances are that what you should have done, is payed the CEO less of a percentage, and spent the savings on properly armoured pipes.

By definition, water which has an ANY percent chance of giving you a BRAIN EATING PARASITIC AMOEBA INFESTATION, is NOT safe to drink!

St Bernard and Orleans parishes also have a long term problem with giardia in the water. I generally try not to drink tap water in the New Orleans area if I can avoid it.

a reply to: TrueBrit

I agree with your definition of "clean" & "safe to drink"...but lets remember that there are pharmaceutical drug residue in most water systems and the FDA allows an acceptable percentage of rat feces in your food.

a reply to: fshrrex

YOU have an important PM from staff.

~Tenth

a reply to: TrueBrit

Nothing to do with CEO pay, and you can't really armour pipes in the ground. My father owns a plumbing company, so I've seen the different kinds of pipes, a thousand leaks, and the current state of the tech used. We went from lead pipes, to steel/iron pipes, to copper, and now pex hard plastic pipes. The ground in Texas shifts a bit over time, so leaks are to be expected. You can't do much for the older pipes, they can only resist so much pressure, and corrosion over time. Eventually a leak will come into play somewhere along a line, and roots will seek it out. That doesn't much happen to copper pipes, rather sewage.

The pex is current standard for many counties. It's a bit more flexible and quite strong, so is superior overall. The problem with pex is the crimping system to attach pipe together. It needs to be reworked, because per fitting we have more leaks using pex over copper. You can become proficient soldering and rarely have a leak, but pex requires a little luck and even if you test leak free after the dirt is poured over we've seen leaks happen.

I think water treatment needs to get overhauled in the USA. I'd be much more concerned for bugs that are resistant to the chlorine and other chemicals we use to filter them out. There's really no source of water that can be contaminant free. If you get bottled water, you bypass the county/state guidelines and are putting faith in the company to give you good water. You also deal with the plastic leaching of the container. Well water? I'll not take my chances. I purchase 5 gallons at a time through a redbox looking dispenser. It does a lot more extra filtering, but even then the filters have regular scheduled replacement. If the machine gets used too much, the filters could get clogged with gunk and keep dispensing. Then you get a concentrated blast and man that's a horrible taste I've done it before with triple stage filtration under the sink.

Just don't go Howard Hughes on us. There's actually some theories relating to Alzheimer's increase correlating with purified water supplies. We need critters to keep our immune system healthy and balanced. I'd rather not take my chances with a brain eating parasite, thou

a reply to: TrueBrit

I used to drink water on site that had visible 'wrigglers' in it- the boss joked that it was "extra protein" and since I needed to quench my thirst I gulped down a cup or two every time we took a break.

I swear to the rainbow sandwich that I suffered no adverse affects. Cross my Heather and hope to Dinosaur.

I believe that our over the top cleanliness is compromising our immune system, but then again we have parasitic amoebas. We truly like to live dangerously.

a reply to: pl3bscheese

You know what?

You are absolutely right, what I wrote may have been a little over the top. Still... Water which has a chance of giving you a brain eating parasite should not be considered fit to drink. We are not taking about a cramped up gut and a migraine here. This is life or death stuff we are dealing with!

originally posted by: TrueBrit
Water which has a chance of giving you a brain eating parasite should not be considered fit to drink.

Just don't get it up your nose, and you should be ok.

We have a lot of naegleria in the Southeast in the wild. A trip to the lake and you might get it as well. It's sort of endemic. Where you have the worst issues with it is people using tap water for nasal irrigation, which is always a bad choice. Tap water is potable, not sterile.