no water in northern samar town named after water

7/28/2019 No Water in Northern Samar Town Named After Water

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Mercy Dawn T. Chavez BSCE-4th

Year

Hydrology Engr. Otilia Taduyo

Exercise #2

No water in Northern Samar town named after waterBY JAKE SORIANO, GMA NEWS RESEARCH March 22, 2012 3:00pm

140 32 4 280

First of two parts

Walang tubig sa Catubig. [There is no water in a place named after water.]

The residents of Catubig, a 3rd class municipality in Northern Samar, tell many variations of thesame joke.

While the international community celebrates World Water day today, the residents of Catubig

may be forgiven for not joining in. In Northern Samar, the proportion of households without

access to safe water remains high, and far, far from the national rate.

Northern Samar, located some 700 kilometers southeast of the Philippine capital of Manila, is

considered the island of Luzon’s gateway to the Visayas and Mindanao.

Poverty incidence is high. The National Statistical Coordination Board (NSCB) estimates that

41.7 percent of the total families in the province earn less than Php7,017 a month, which is how

much an average family of five needs to stay out of poverty.



Agriculture is the main source of livelihood.

Residents of Catubig are mostly coconut and rice farmers. They take pride in their town being

labelled the province’s rice granary, but the water situation also causes grave problems in

irrigation. Their stories, which start proud, are punctuated by the same Catubig joke.

It is a cruel joke that betrays the despair of many residents of the town for an adequate supply

of clean water.

Ben Sorio refuses to get in on the joke. He insists water is not a problem in the village.

Yet, Viena Maria in Catubig where Ben lives is tagged by the National Anti-Poverty Commission

(NAPC) as one of the waterless barangays.

The NAPC, the government agency in charge of programs to address basic inequities in the

Philippines, determines that a barangay is waterless when more than half of its total population

does not have access to safe water.

Water literally is life in the case of Ben and the people of Viena Maria, which is thirty minutes

away from the poblacion (town center) by habal-habal (improvised motorcycle).

Habal-habal, a motorcycle usually with extended seats that could accommodate more than two

people, is common in rural areas where there are limited modes of transportation because of

the rough terrain.

"Pag wala kaming pagkain, tubig na lang [When we don’t have anything to eat, we just drink

water,] " says Ben, who is also an elected barangay kagawad (village councilor).

Marly Orlaza, wife of the barangay captain, thus earning her the nickname Kapitana, echoes

Ben's claim that water supply is the least of their concerns.

"Hindi naman problema dito ang tubig kasi marami namang tubig na inumin [Water is not a

problem here; we have adequate drinking water,] " she says. To prove her point, she repeats:

"Ok naman pag tubig lang ang pag-usapan, maraming tubig [If we’re only talking of water, we

have plenty.] "

The village's source of drinking water is a spring right next to the river. This spring is some fiveminutes away from the houses of Viena Maria residents. During monsoon season, however, the

village gets flooded. Floodwaters fill the spring and residents have to go up the nearby

mountain to look for other springs.

Plenty of water in the village, Marly continues, before revealing the problem bothering them.



" Ang problema lang namin dito yung nagkakasakit. Ang dami talagang nagkakasakit [Our only

problem here really is the sick people. A lot of people are getting sick,] " she says.

She describes what ails the sick: very high fever and extreme pain in the abdomen. The few

residents who have been able to visit the rural health unit in the poblacion disclose that they

were told they have the symptoms of typhoid fever.

Intake of contaminated food or water causes typhoid. The sick residents of Viena Maria

couldn’t have been eating the same food.

Suddenly, the only thing the village has in abundance, the drinking water the spring provides,

becomes sinister. This source of life for Ben and for everyone else, this water that gets them

through hungry days, could be the very thing causing the entire town's sickness.

Water pumps and public faucets scattered throughout town are the main sources of water of Northern Samar residents.GMA News

Sick families

By Marly's estimates, at least 20 households out of the 62 in Viena Maria, or a third of the

population of the entire barangay, have been sick since January when residents started having

fever and experienced pains in their abdomens.

"Hindi lang isang tao sa isang bahay. Kasi halimbawa ganito, pag galing sa isa, tapos yung isa

naman [Not just one person for each household. It starts with one member getting sick, then

the other members of the family follow,]" she says. "Tulad ngayon, dun sa isang bahay [Likethat household over there ,]" she points at one house, "tatlo silang may sakit [three are sick.]"

In Ben's household, it's four sick children plus his wife and himself.

"Una, nagkasakit yung anak ko. Sumunod yung misis ko. Tapos, yung tatlo na anak ko na

maliliit. Tapos, sunod ako. Kaya anim kaming nakahiga sa sahig namin. May sakit [My child got



sick first. Then my wife. Then my three small children. Then me. One time, all six of us were

lying here on the floor, sick,]" he says.

He forces an embarrassed smile, revealing bleeding gums. He says he is still sick. His wife went

to the poblacion, with their son to see the manggagamot (folk healer).

"Si Susan, yung anak ko, may sakit din [My daughter Susan is sick, too]," he offers. Susan, now

married, lives in another household with her husband and two kids. Both children are sick.

Susan's husband, Jesus, also got the fever and the abdominal pain but recovered quickly.

Children under five are the most common victims of waterborne diseases.GMA News

Waterborne diseases

Catubig sanitation officer Ophir Alburan says that out of the 47 barangays in the town, only two

have safe water. The water from the other 45 villages tested positive for coliforms,

particularly E. coli .

The population of Catubig in 2011 was estimated to be 31,287. That same year, more than 500

patients were admitted in the municipal hospital with diarrhea or typhoid: two in every one

hundred residents got sick of either waterborne disease.

In 2010, there were 361 reported cases of diarrhea and 282 typhoid cases based on figures

from the field health service information report of the municipality.

Actual figures could be higher. The numbers are drawn only from admitted hospital cases and

exclude patients who were not brought to health facilities.

These cases add up to make diarrhea the second leading cause of sickness in the entire

province of Northern Samar. More than 524 people out of 100,000 are bound to get sick of the

said disease, based on 2010 numbers from the provincial health office.



Diarrhea is the tenth leading cause of death in the province, killing almost seven people in every

100,000 residents.

“Most cases affect children under five,” says Dr. Myrna Trongcoso, municipal health officer of

Catarman, the provincial capital.

Residents of the capital themselves are not spared.

In the provincial hospital, Roland and Jonalyn Montano sit by the bed of their daughter, waiting

for her condition to improve.

Nurses are not very optimistic about baby Jayleen. She is in the section of the pedia ward for

“toxic” cases: it is right in front of the nurses’ station so they could closely monitor the sick

babies who are in very critical condition.

Nine-month old Jayleen was brought to the hospital severely dehydrated from diarrhea and

with a 40-degree fever. She has had three seizures in the last 24 hours and is having difficulty in

breathing.

Roland's family has been getting their drinking water from a poso (water pump) he himself

built in their house. Five other households share the same water source. The adults no longer

get sick from drinking the water from the poso, but three babies, including Jayleen, had

diarrhea.

Access to safe water

The Montanos of Catarman and the Sorios of Catubig are only two of the many households who

resort to other ways of getting water in the absence of a reliable water system in the province.



Records of the Northern Samar provincial office show that out of more than 110,000

households in Northern Samar, only some 80,000 have access to safe drinking water .

This translates to a 73 percent access rate for 2011, below the national rate of 84.1 based on

figures from the NSCB.

The province’s access to water is also way below the MDG target of 86.5 percent by 2015, and

actually only equals the Philippines' baseline rate for access to water in 1990 .

The problem with water sources in the province, like the water pump the Montano household

uses, and the Viena Maria spring, is that it is hard to determine their continued potability. They

may be safe for a time but not everytime.

Dr. Ricardo Bocar, who heads the technical department and is in charge of health statistics of

the provincial health office, explains that water from sources exposed to the elements is

extremely susceptible to contamination. Water samples may test negative for coliforms and

fecal elements, but only during the period of the testing. Potable water now might not be safe

for drinking tomorrow.

“Hindi naman makaka-expect kung ok palagi [You can’t expect that water from these sources

are safe all the time,] ” Dr. Bocar explains. Bird droppings and even human waste, for example,

could pollute these water sources, he says.

Health workers shoulder the burden

Health workers in Northern Samar not only help sick patients recover, they also take charge of

educating residents on how to ensure that their drinking water is safe.

“Minsan hindi nila alam na ang maruming tubig ang dahilan ng pagtatae nila [Sometimes, they

don’t even know that unsanitary water causes diseases,]” explains Dr. Sylvia Pacle, municipal

health officer of Catubig.

“Tinuturuan namin sila na magpakulo ng tubig for fifteen minutes or more para pwede nang

inumin [We have to teach them to boil water for fifteen minutes or more before drinking it, ] ”

she adds.

She delivers a variation of the old joke: “Catubig, merong tubig. Hindi lang malinis [Catubig haswater. It’s just not clean].”

When boiling water is not enough, health workers resort to distributing water purifying tablets

and chlorine as an immediate remedy so the residents themselves could cure their water.

But these are just short-term solutions.



“Yung DOH nagbibigay ng funds [for the disinfectants]. Pati UNICEF, to be distributed to the

municipalities. Pero depende lang din sa funds. It’s not regular, hindi laging nabibigay [The

Department of Health funds the disinfectants distributed to the municipalities. UNICEF helps

too. But funds do not come regularly],” says provincial health officer Dr. Mary Ann Avalon.

“If the province does not have these disinfectants, we go to the local chief executive and try toadvocate and ask for their support,” she adds.

Residents, long used to their water source, do not seem to take the disinfectants well.

“May nagpunta dito, sinabi sa amin na lagyan daw ng chlorine ang tubig. Pero hindi kami

sumusunod kasi ang lasa ng tubig medyo matabang. Hindi katulad ng galing sa

bukal [Someone came here and told us to disinfect our water with chlorine. But we don’t want

to because the water tasted different. Not like the water from the spring],” Ben says.

“Hindi ako sanay [I’m not used to the taste],” he says. “ Ayaw ko ng baho [I do not like the bad

smell].”

His sick wife, Nympha, and their son arrive home before noon. She is so frail she does not seem

to have any flesh left in her. She speaks only the local dialect; a neighbor has to translate.

Themanggagamot was not in town, she says. She and her son just have to try their luck some

other day, when they have enough money again for the habal-habal .

Taking the habal-habal costs thirty pesos one way for each person from Viena Maria to the

poblacion. To residents of Viena Maria who cannot afford three meals a day, sixty pesos is too

much.

When they do get the chance, only the most ill go to the poblacion.

When Ben's family gets sick, only he and his wife go to town for a check up to save on cost.

“Yung mga anak ko, binibili ko na lang ng gamot. Nagtatanong ako sa midwife kung ano ang

gamot na kailangan ng anak ko. Tinatanong na lang sa akin ng midwife, ilang taon na sya [I just

tell the health worker the symptoms and the age of my children and buy the prescribed

medicines,]"Bensays.



In the absence of a reliable water system in Northern Samar, residents resort to other sources

of water GMA News

Sustainability problems

Sustainable access to safe water remains out of grasp.

"Kung meron mang program, o project na dumating sa amin before, like yung mga dine-

develop yung mga spring, ang problema nun yung sustainability. Kasi hindi naalagaan

ng community, at sa local level, pag nasira na, wala na [There are water supply projects like

spring developments but the problem is sustainability. The utilities don’t last,] " Dr. Avalon

explains.

Water pipes, for example, over time get wear and tear and damage and, without funds forproper maintenance and repair, ultimately become unusable.

“Yung mga pump sa mga bara-barangay, mamaya-maya, nasisira [Water pumps in villages

easily get broken ,]” Dr. Avalon says.

Still, she remains patient.

“Kailangan din ng behavior change sa mga tao. Hindi lang naman bigay na lang tayo nang

bigay ng tulong [People’s attitudes toward the water problem should also change because the

help we could provide are not boundless,] ” she explains. “ Alam ko yung change talaga,

matagal yang proseso. Hindi naman kaagad-agad yan mababago [But I know that change

would take a long time. You can’t expect change to happen overnight.] ”

She recalls that Northern Samar has been having the same water problem since she could

remember.



“Nung maliit pa ako, ganun na yun. Hanggang ngayon, ganun pa rin. Ilang taon na ako

ngayon [This is the same situation when I was still a child. Look how old I am now.]” She pauses

for a moment, then she laughs and adds, “Don’t ask. I’m in my golden years.”

“We just have to be patient. Lalo na [ang] health workers, dapat pasensyoso talaga [We health

workers really need to be patient],” she says. “Wag magsisimangot . What is theadvantage kung magsisimangot ka [Don’t scowl. It won’t help].” — RSJ, GMA News

no water in northern samar town named after water

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