Water Pollution in Latin America

There are many countries around the world that are suffering from water pollution, especially nations that don’t necessarily have money to deal with the problems or just choose not to address the issue. I chose to focus on Latin America, our closest neighboring countries to the United States.

One of the biggest sources of pollution comes from the use of pesticides in agriculture, especially in Brazil. These pesticides contain nitrogen and phosphorus, which is not meant to be consumed by humans. The Amazon Rainforest has been converted into farmlands, where farmers will use pesticides to prevent their crops from being consumed by bugs. However, some of the chemicals find their way into rivers and other sources of water (Mekonnen et al. 2015).

There are also new pollutants that are starting to gain more attention, which are known as micro-pollutants, or EP. These pollutants can be either synthetic or natural chemicals, and can be found in a variety of sources and items that are used in daily life. These items can have adverse affects and may be harmful to human health. Most of these contaminants were found in the drinking water supply in many different countries. They have managed to contaminate the surface water and the groundwater (only seen in Mexico). The big problem around these EPs is that there is very little regulation of them even with the knowledge of the dangers of many of these to human health and life (Pena-Guzman et al. 2019).

One problem with water pollution that is generally overlooked is natural contamination of water, specifically groundwater sources. One of the biggest contaminants found in many freshwater sources in Latin America is arsenic (As). In many of the locations of groundwater sources there are high levels of pollutants that occur that seep into the water. Another way these minerals get into the water is via erosion and and weathering of ores that contain these minerals. However, these minerals can enter waterways through anthropogenic sources and pollution (Bundschuh et al. 2010).

There are many different causes for water pollution in different countries of Latin America, but one of the biggest found throughout many of the countries is dumping of sewage. In fact, more than 70% of sewage is dumped into water bodies. Many water bodies like river basins in Latin America are used for garbage and waste from mining and agriculture, most noticeable seen in Brazil. A lot of these countries are lacking in infrastructure for water treatment and governance for the issue. There is enough to treat some of the water, but a very small amount is actually treated (Mekonnen et al. 2015).

A lot of the contamination from arsenic and other minerals comes from natural processes. The two main processes are mobilization and retention. They get released under many different climate conditions and settings. Weathering also plays a huge part, especially if rivers erode rocks that contain these minerals. The minerals will seep into the water, which is then consumed by people who may drink from the river (Bundschuh et al. 2010). One important item to note is that while the mobilization of arsenic is a natural process, it has been heavily affected by humans. In countries like Chile, Peru and Bolivia, smelting and other mining activities are the dominant sources for arsenic. Pesticides in Mexico and processing industries in Brazil are other sources for arsenic.

There are many different countries that are affected by polluted water bodies, but this map here shows a few examples that are in major cities and are bigger sources of water.

Polluted bodies of water in Latin America

Argentina was the first country to report an arsenic problem. However, since then, the problem has been very neglected and has been seen in multiple countries, like Bolivia and Peru (Kumar et al. 2019).

In Latin America, millions of people do not have access to clean drinking water on a daily basis and do not have access to sanitation facilities. This causes major problems, as approximately 2 million people die from contaminated water, most of which are children under the age of 5. Diarrhea is one of the main issues associated with drinking contaminated water, which leads to the deaths of many young children, especially in Latin America. Younger children are particularly vulnerable to dehydration and nutritional loss, which come from the diarrhea. When they are exposed to this early in life, the children may not get important nutrients, which can eventually then lead to malnutrition and anemia and other health-related issues (Prashad 2020).

Many people in Latin America do not even know that they are consuming arsenic or other dangerous toxins in their drinking water. Arsenic is a tasteless and odorless mineral, so people may not even know that they are consuming it. This could lead to arsenic toxicity and poisoning (Kumar et al. 2019). Mercury is another very dangerous chemical that seeps into water bodies via mining and and ore extraction. Mercury is a very toxic mineral, and some rural communities in Ecuador had high levels of mercury in their blood (Laborde et al. 2015).

My hope is that more countries in Latin America start to take notice and address the issues that are causing huge problems for many different people. I believe that everyone deserves access to clean drinking water, no matter how rich or poor they are.