Environmental Health Student Portal
Connecting School Students to Environmental Health Information

Waterborne Diseases & Illnesses

Imagine swimming in a pool of bugs, worms, and poisons. In some natural water sources, you actually would be! You just wouldn’t see them. Microscopic organisms like bacteria, viruses, and parasites may live in our water supplies. Chemicals and heavy metals may get into our water, too. If you swim or bathe in this water, drink it, or wash food with it, you could get sick. We call these illnesses waterborne diseases, because people get them from contaminated water. The water can also be harmful to other animals. It may cause minor or severe illness, or even death. Contaminated water can lead to disease outbreaks in a local area, country, or across the globe.

At this Web site, discover how people affect the environment to increase the risks of disease outbreaks and what you can do to protect yourself.

Explore the links at right to:

• Learn about giardiasis, malaria, cholera, and other waterborne diseases.
• Find out what’s in your water and how it becomes contaminated.
• Follow young reporters in a five-part video as they discover the source of a cholera outbreak.
• Play an interactive game to solve a medical mystery.
• Find out how diseases are transmitted between people and animals.
• Read the true story of Typhoid Mary.
• Play the interactive game, "Outbreak at Watersedge".
• Find out why waterborne diseases are a greater concern in developing countries.
• Learn about the effects of algal blooms, toxins, and red tides in coastal waters.
• Read about disease outbreaks around the world.