Water Quality and Organic Pollution with Health Risk Assessment in China: A Short Review

Although water quality has been improved in the last two decades, water pollution by organic contaminants has remained a non-negligible issue in China. It is worthwhile to assess human exposure risks to waterborne organic contaminants and find the relation between them and carcinogenic risks. This work reviews the spatiotemporal patterns of water quality and typical organic contaminants in drinking water sources (i.e., surface water, groundwater, and tap water) in relation to age-standardized incidences of total cancers in China over 16 years. The improvement of water quality for drinking water sources seemed to produce a positive effect in reducing incidences of polluted water-related diseases and digestive system cancers. Although the total accumulative lifetime cancer risk for residents through water drinking and dermal exposure to typical carcinogenic organic contaminants was lower than the latest incidences of digestive system cancers and total cancers excluding lung cancer published by the Chinese government, their similar spatial patterns indicated that this exposure should be considered as one of potential factors for carcinogenic risks. Finally, further efforts to explore the correlation between human exposure to organic contaminants in water and related health effects on a long-term basis should be helpful for establishing and implementing feasible management strategies to reduce disease burdens.