Pakistan Council of Research in Water Resources (PCRWR) has found 10 brands of bottled water unsafe for human consumption.
PCRWR Director General Lubna Naheed Bukhari has urged authorities to take action against the companies selling contaminated bottled water.
She said the poor quality of drinking water has forced a large number of public to buy bottled water. But, she added, many water companies have been found selling contaminated bottled water.
Bukhari said the Pakistan Standard Quality Control Authority (PSQCA) had found 10 brands of bottled water including (the somewhat colourfuly named) Butt Water ,Dewan Water, Express, Aqua National, Natur Aqua, , Best Natural, Noble, AFRA, NASH, Aftab Qureshi and Ideal Life unsafe due to chemical and microbiological contamination.The government has tasked the PCRWR to monitor the brands and make the results public on a quarterly basis.
According to the report the council examined 76 brands for quarter October-December 2014, and found 10 brands unsafe for human consumption.
Four of these 10 unsafe brands —Butt Water, Aqua National, Nature Aqua, Best Natural — contained arsenic, which is a poisonous chemical and causes diabetes, kidney diseases, hypertension, heart diseases, birth defects, black foot diseases, and multiple types of cancers.
Two brands, Aftab Qureshi and Ideal Life, were found to be unsafe due to microbiological contamination which can cause cholera, diarrhea, dysentery, hepatitis, and typhoid.
The remaining brands were found unsafe due to presence of higher level of sodium, potassium and TDS.Bukhari said that the national quality control authorities should initiate legal action against the companies, which are supplying contaminated bottled water.
