摘要：Provision of safe drinking water is a worldwide issue especially in arid and semi arid countries of the world where freshwater supply is limited. As such, Saudi Arabia is facing an acute problem of safe drinking water to the community. A field study was carried to evaluate household drinking water quality in Al-Ahsa city, Saudi Arabia. Water quality parameters such as pH and total dissolved solids were higher than the permissible limits for drinking water according to Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) standards. The water quality did not meet the recommended acceptability ranges of drinking water for pH, turbidity, TOTAL DISSOLVED SOLIDS (TDS), hardness, Na, Cl and SO4 as prescribed by World Health Organization (WHO). The concentration of trace elements in water samples was within the acceptable limits recommended by WHO and GCC. The dominated water type was Na-Ca-Cl-SO4 and classified as very hard water. The microbiological contamination was more prevalent than the chemical contamination. Out of 199 total water samples, 58% (117 samples) tested positive for total bacteria but about 8% (9 out of 117 samples) tested positive for Fecal coliform, while one sample tested positive for E. coli bacteria. In conclusion, all the available drinking water should be examined for microbiological contamination regularly and create awareness among the community members for proper maintenance and cleaning of water storage facilities.
