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Assessing Contamination of Groundwater with Fluoride and Human Health Impact

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Geostatistics and Geospatial Technologies for Groundwater Resources in India

Part of the book series: Springer Hydrogeology ((SPRINGERHYDRO))

Abstract

All over the world, groundwater is considered as the prime source for drinking water, but this water may be contaminated though various elements, among which fluoride is most common in many developed as well as developing countries. By consuming these fluoride contaminated water various types of fluorosis disease sets in socioeconomically backward rural people of arid and semi-arid areas where groundwater occurs in hard rock structure. Purulia district of West Bengal state of India is such an ideal area which drags attention to execute some research work to analyse the inherent causes of fluoride contamination of groundwater and its spatial variation as well as assessment of various types of fluorosis diseases people have been suffering with. Here people consume fluoride contaminated water even up to the level of 8.28 mg/Land it is well above the maximum permissible limit (1.5 mg/L), leading to dental, skeletal as well as various non-skeletal fluorosis diseases. It needs urgent attention from the academicians, planners, as well as administrative persons for implementation of medical measures, interventions through supply of safe drinking water, and training and awareness programmes to mitigate the problem.

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Acknowledgements

Author would like to thank the PHED, Purulia for providing data and guiding in the process of surveying of the villages, and the villagers who have assisted in providing valuable information regarding their socioeconomic and health conditions.

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Author declares that there is no conflict of interest in the present research.

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Correspondence to Somnath Rudra .

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Rudra, S. (2021). Assessing Contamination of Groundwater with Fluoride and Human Health Impact. In: Adhikary, P.P., Shit, P.K., Santra, P., Bhunia, G.S., Tiwari, A.K., Chaudhary, B.S. (eds) Geostatistics and Geospatial Technologies for Groundwater Resources in India. Springer Hydrogeology. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-62397-5_15

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