Bacteriological quality of community well water and public health concerns in Enugu urban, Nigeria

Background: Water is a basic necessity used by humans for both domestic and industrial uses. Next to air, water is essential to life. It takes up about 71% of the earth’s surface. The objective of this study is to determine the bacteriological quality of well water in Enugu urban, Nigeria Methodology: A total of 60 domestic wells were selected from Abakpa, Obiagu and Achara layouts in Engu urban, Nigeria by stratified random sampling method, with 20 wells selected from each area based on location of well sites and construction parameters. Water samples were collected from each well using a sterile 200ml plastic bottle for bacteriological analysis to estimate total bacteria count in colony forming unit (cfu)/ml, total coliform count in most probable number (mpn)/100ml, and faecal coliform count in most probable number (mpn)/100ml. Bacterial isolates were identified using Gram reaction and conventional biochemical tests including catalase and coagulase for Gram positive bacteria, and oxidase, citrate utilization, hydrogen sulfide, indole, urease, methyl red, Voges Proskauer, and sugar fermentation tests for Gram negative bacteria. Antibiotic susceptibility testing (AST) of each isolate was performed by the disk diffusion method against selected antibiotics including penicillin G (10µg), ciprofloxacin (5µg), streptomycin (10µg), amoxicillin-clavulanic acid (20/10µg), and trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole (25µg), and result interpreted using the European Committee for Antimicrobial Susceptibility Testing (EUCAST) break points. Comparative statistics of the data was performed using analysis of variance (ANOVA) with p<0.05 considered statistically significant. Results: The well water in the three layouts were heavily contaminated as shown by comparatively high mean total bacteria counts of 0.8825±0.66x104 cfu/ml, 0.8435±0.6413x104 cfu/ml, and 0.8384±0.5948x104 cfu/ml for Abakpa, Obiagu and Achara layouts respectively (p=0.9714). The mean total coliform counts were 5.15±5.284, 5.45±4.31 and 5.05±4.763 mpn/100ml (p=0.8038), and the mean faecal coliform counts were 2.4±3.393, 2.65±2.796 and 2.05±2.35 mpn/100ml (p=0.9631) for Abakpa, Obiagu and Achara layouts respectively. A total of 50 pathogenic bacterial isolates were identified; Klebsiella pneumoniae 21 (43.8%), Escherichia coli 13 (30.0%), Proteus spp 6 (12.5%), Pseudomonas aeruginosa 6 (12.5%), and Staphylococcus aureus 2 (4.2%). The AST result shows that 75% of K. pneumoniae, E. coli, Proteus spp and S. aureus were resistant to all five antibiotics tested. Conclusion: These findings showed high faecal contamination of domestic well water sources, which poses a significant infection risk to the community. Proper water treatment measures and personal hygiene practices are recommended, and well sites should be located at a safe distance from septic tanks, pit latrines, flowing gutters and refuse dump sites

The question of EU legitimacy in the Social OMC peer review process

This paper examines the structural kand relational factors that affect perceptions of legitimacy in the EU's Social Open Method of Coordination, particularly in its peer review process. Using multi-level governance as its analytical framework, the paper uses network analysis to examine the actor networks and relations within the peer review process over time, and links this with different conceptions of input and throughput legitimacy, and the findings show that the peer reviews do not significantly feed into either input or throughput legitimacy. While input legitimacy is improved somewhat by the inclusion of additional actors in the policy process, these actors do not have a clear role to play and the peer reviews remain driven by traditional actors. In terms of throughput, the process does positively address issues of transparency, procedure and information provision, there is no clear path for translating these processes into an increase in perceptions of legitimacy

What unites Europe and what divides it? Solidarity and the European heritage reconsidered

Despite the on-set on new divisions, there is a strong case to be made for the view that ultimately Europe is more united than divided. There is still significant continuity with the post-war project of reconstruction and peace and that this common ground that constitutes the European heritage needs to be given greater recognition. One of the defining features of European self-understanding is opposition to war

Trade union strategies in the age of austerity: the Romanian public sector in comparative perspective

This article examines the impact of the economic crisis and its aftermath on collective bargaining, by comparing reactions to austerity policies of trade unions in healthcare and education in Romania. We develop an encompassing theoretical framework that links strategies used by trade unions with power resources, costs and union democracy. In a tight labour market generated by the massive emigration of doctors, unions in healthcare have successfully deployed their resources to advance their interests and obtain significant wage increases and better working conditions. We also show that in the aftermath of the crisis, healthcare trade unions have redefined their strategies and adopted a more militant stance based on a combination of local strikes, strike threats and temporary alliances with various stakeholders. By comparison, we find that unions in the education sector have adopted less effective strategies built around negotiations with governments combined with national-level militancy

House price Keynesianism and the contradictions of the modern investor subject

This article conceptualises the marked downturn in UK house prices in the 2007-2009 period in relation to longer-term processes of national economic restructuring centred on a new model of homeownership. The structure of UK house prices has been impacted markedly by the Labour Government‟s efforts to ingrain a particular notion of financial literacy amid the move towards an increasingly asset-based system of welfare. New model welfare recipients and new model homeowners have thereby been co-constituted in a manner consistent with a new UK growth regime of „house price Keynesianism‟. However, the investor subjects who drive such growth are necessarily rendered uncertain as compared with the idealised image of Government policy because of their reliance on the credit-creating decisions of private financial institutions. The recent steep decline in UK house prices is explained here as an epiphenomenon of the disruptive effect on the idealised image caused by the dependence of investor subjects on pricing dynamics not of their making

From social contract to 'social contrick' : the depoliticisation of economic policy-making under Harold Wilson, 1974–75

The 1974-79 Labour Governments were elected on the basis of an agreement with the TUC promising a redistribution of income and wealth known as the Social Contract. However, the Government immediately began to marginalise these commitments in favour of preferences for incomes policy and public expenditure cuts, which has led the Social Contract to be described as the 'Social Contrick'. These changes were legitimised through a process of depoliticisation, and using an Open Marxist framework and evidence from the National Archives, the paper will show that the Treasury's exchange rate strategy and the need to secure external finance placed issues of confidence at the centre of political debate, allowing the Government to argue there was no alternative to the introduction of incomes policy and the reduction of public expenditure

Kinstate intervention in ethnic conflicts : Albania and Turkey compared

Albania and Turkey did not act in overtly irredentist ways towards their ethnic brethren in neighboring states after the end of communism. Why, nonetheless, did Albania facilitate the increase of ethnic conflict in Kosovo and Macedonia, while Turkey did not, with respect to the Turks of Bulgaria? I argue that kin-states undergoing transition are more prone to intervene in external conflicts than states that are not, regardless of the salience of minority demands in the host-state. The transition weakens the institutions of the kin-state. Experiencing limited institutional constraints, self-seeking state officials create alliances with secessionist and autonomist movements across borders alongside their own ideological, clan-based and particularistic interests. Such alliances are often utilized to advance radical domestic agendas. Unlike in Albania's transition environment, in Turkey there were no emerging elites that could potentially form alliances and use external movements to legitimize their own domestic existence or claims