Microbial water quality analysis and human health risk assessment of Royal Belum State Park / Nur Athirah Kamaruddin

Temenggor Lake located in Royal Belum State Park is an important water resource for indigenous people, an ecosystem for aqua organisms and a place for water recreational activities for visitors. Hence, we need to know the status of water quality to ensure the water is not a hazard or tend to give risk of illness to the users. There have been activity of sewage disposal from houseboat directly into the lake and pollutant inputs came from indigenous people household waste as well as from domestic and wild animals were contributed to the deterioration of water quality as result of hazard to their health. An analysis of microbial water quality and human health risk assessment in Temenggor Lake, Royal Belum State Park has been conducted at two types of sampling locations, namely visitor water recreational areas and indigenous people water activity areas to determine the value of physicochemical and bacterial concentration, to examine the influence of the human activities on the water quality and to evaluate the health risk of users associated with water exposure in Temenggor Lake. Water quality was determined by measuring physicochemical and microbiological parameters. For bacterial analysis, membrane filtration technique was used. The t-test was used to compare all the parameters between indigenous people and visitor areas to find out the differences of water quality in different water activities areas. Quantitative Microbiological Risk Analysis method had used to evaluate the risk of illness towards the water user. The risk was estimated by calculation of daily risk of infection, annual risk of infection and risk of illness per annual and per event. The results of this study has showed most of the parameter were within acceptable range for primary contact water activities. However, for certain parameters such as pH, enterococci and E. coli at station A03 and during wet seasons has shown the condition of the lake is deteriorating. The water quality during sampling in November 2021 at all stations was acidic (less than 5.5) may relate with rainfall events. This study revealed that water quality in indigenous people and visitor water activities areas was significantly different due to being affected by different types of human’s activity and other factors such as geohydrological conditions, topography, land use, environmental conditions and events Thus, identification of all possible contamination sources, awareness of changes that might negatively affect water quality, and provision of adequate information to the public are important preventive measures to protect public health. From the results of health risk assessment, water activities and recreational in certain areas of Royal Belum State Park were exposed varying degrees of health risk. Notably, indigenous people settlements areas record high risk of illness for both E. coli and Salmonella spp., mainly at station A03 (Kg. Sungai Tiang). This study provides baseline data to help in future management strategies to ensure the conservation of the natural landscape and economic viability, in addition to the protection of the local community.