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Lead exceedance in drinking water samples found under Enhanced Water Quality Monitoring Programme
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     A Government spokesman said today (November 3) that under the Enhanced Water Quality Monitoring Programme (Enhanced Programme), the Water Supplies Department (WSD) collected drinking water samples from 15 consumers' taps last week (October 25 to 29) and exceedance in lead over the Hong Kong Drinking Water Standards was found in the water samples taken from a private non-domestic premises in Wan Chai.

     The exceedance case over the Hong Kong Drinking Water Standards was the first one found under the Enhanced Programme since its commencement in December 2017.

     After the test results became available, the WSD promptly contacted the responsible persons of the premises concerned and demanded that they inform all occupiers in the building and adopt appropriate preventive and mitigation measures, including using alternative drinking water sources (such as distilled water); display notices at conspicuous locations of the building; and employ a qualified consultant or person promptly to conduct a detailed investigation with a view to ascertaining the causes of exceedance and implementing corresponding rectification works.

     The WSD will continue to closely follow up on the progress of implementation of the mitigation and rectification measures, as well as provide assistance, if necessary. In case the responsible persons have not implemented effective mitigation measures within a reasonable period of time, the WSD could take corresponding actions in accordance with the Waterworks Ordinance in order to ensure the safety of drinking water for the consumers.

     The WSD has extended the drinking water quality monitoring to consumers' taps by implementing the Enhanced Programme since 2017 to collect drinking water samples from consumers' taps in randomly selected premises to monitor water quality. Up to now, the WSD has collected drinking water samples from about 2 000 premises.

     The relevant statistics on weekly monitoring data at consumers' taps under the Enhanced Programme, including the above case, are available on the WSD's website.
 
Ends/Wednesday, November 3, 2021
Issued at HKT 19:00
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