An investigation of health and lifestyle in people who have private water supplies at home.

People living in 102 rural households on private water supplies, and their matched controls on mains water, were asked about their health in a postal questionnaire. People using private water supplies were more likely to be from farming families (and so in socioeconomic class II) and less likely to be retired than their controls on mains water. Families using contaminated private supplies ('dirty' water) reported lower rates of colds and respiratory illnesses than people using mains water or uncontaminated private supplies ('clean' water). The mains-water users had visited their general practitioners more often in the last three months. There was no difference in the incidence of acute abdominal symptoms recorded in a diary kept by survey participants. Considering children, who are more susceptible to infectious illnesses, the only difference in health was that children in the families with 'dirty' private water took more medication (though reported illness less often) than others. In conclusion, the study indicated that private water is not harmful to health, but the results must be put in the context of evidence from other work.