Seventy-one percent of the world's water-associated disease outbreaks reported between 1990 and 2008 were water-borne diseases caused by micro-organisms like E. coli that enter water through fecal contamination and cause infection when humans consume contaminated water. That was a major finding in a newly published study conducted by Ohio State University scientists who constructed a massive database containing information about 1,428 water-associated disease outbreaks. They used the model to predict that western Europe, Central Africa and Northern India are at higher risk for water-borne diseases, especially diarrhea and other complications from E. coli, and that the risk in Europe is primarily driven by water-carried diseases that tend to occur in recreational areas. Based … [Read more...]