No Clean Water: The Colonias of the Rio Grande Valley (1976)

<v Bill Parrish>colonias were not as well-informed as they could have been. <v Narrator>That's for sure, that people had to locate their colonias in unincorporated, <v Narrator>unregulated areas that had no water service or sewers or indoor plumbing <v Narrator>or proper drainage. And the situation still prevails today. <v Narrator>Dan Hawkins, who's been running tu clínica familiar, your family clinic since <v Narrator>1971. <v Dan Hawkins>The major single cause of these problems is the water. <v Dan Hawkins>The vast majority of the people living out in rural areas are drinking water, either <v Dan Hawkins>drawn from canals which are used to irrigate the fields and are laced with insecticides. <v Dan Hawkins>And they have bacteria from fecal matter from the cows and the animals out <v Dan Hawkins>there, or from a rain barrel, which is also subject to the <v Dan Hawkins>same sorts of problems, or from shallow wells, which often run three to five feet and <v Dan Hawkins>may perhaps as deep as 20 feet under the ground. <v Dan Hawkins>The problem is that these shallow wells are often located close to the house and there's <v Dan Hawkins>something else that's located close to the house, and that's the outdoor privy.

<v Dan Hawkins>In most rural areas, they don't have running water, so they don't have indoor plumbing. <v Dan Hawkins>And the problem there is, of course, that the bacteria from the fecal matter will run <v Dan Hawkins>through the water table and contaminate the water that's being taken up to be used for <v Dan Hawkins>bathing and drinking and what have you. <v Narrator>Here are results of tests done a few years ago on the water from two shallow <v Narrator>wells in two different colonias. <v Narrator>In both cases, the Hidalgo County Health Department found the water contaminated <v Narrator>by coliform bacteria. <v Narrator>As the health department notes at the bottom of the report, water of satisfactory <v Narrator>bacteriological quality should be free from coliform organisms. <v Narrator>Another means of getting water is to haul it in from wherever they can get it. <v Narrator>Sometimes the drive can be 10 miles or more. <v Narrator>Three or four times a week they go in battered pickups to a store, <v Narrator>a gas station or a friend's house in town, wherever they can find a source <v Narrator>of clean water. <v Narrator>They haul and store the water in discarded 55 gallon drums, which in <v Narrator>some cases were used to hold the toxic pesticides sprayed on the fields.

<v Narrator>If people are lucky, there's a tap along the main road running by the colonia, <v Narrator>like this one in Colonia Balboa, provided by the city of McCallan, where <v Narrator>Pedro Ibanez comes to get water for his wife and three children. <v Narrator>Ibanez is a farm worker who's been in the United States for 20 years. <v Narrator>The last seven as a resident of Balboa get wet. <v Pedro Ibanez>We're lucky that the public water hydrant is this close to our house. <v Pedro Ibanez>Of course, if I had the money, I would buy a house within the inner city <v Pedro Ibanez>for water and indoor bathrooms are already in service. <v Narrator>Here's a letter from the Hidalgo County Health Department sent to support a grant <v Narrator>application for a Colonial's water system. <v Narrator>The letter says that water is stored in rusty barrels that are open and exposed <v Narrator>to animals and dust and filled with mosquito larva and fecal contamination.

<v Narrator>It is impossible, the letter concluded for the residents to practice good personal <v Narrator>hygiene earlier that day. <v Narrator>Ubon News made one of his frequent trips to Dr. Ramiro Caso, who runs a busy <v Narrator>clinic in the McAllen barrio. <v Narrator>This time the visit was to treat Jose Angel, his three year old son, <v Narrator>who's been sick a good deal of his life. <v Narrator>The boy has been to Castro's office with several water related diseases stomach <v Narrator>parasites and skin infections, plus pneumonia and several bouts of flu. <v Narrator>And if there is sometimes not enough water for health, sometimes there <v Narrator>is too much. <v Dr. Ramiro Caso>The outhouses will flood. <v Dr. Ramiro Caso>You actually get a foot or two of water in these colonias and the <v Dr. Ramiro Caso>outhouses are flooded and you actually get stool <v Dr. Ramiro Caso>outside and these people's yards where kids are playing and people are walking. <v Dr. Ramiro Caso>So actually you have kids actually playing in their own stool and walking <v Dr. Ramiro Caso>through their own stool when you get that kind of situation because of improper drainage.

<v Dr. Ramiro Caso>Because of the presence of outhouses, many of the <v Dr. Ramiro Caso>organisms, the infected organisms, bacteria and viral <v Dr. Ramiro Caso>are transmitted through stool. <v Dr. Ramiro Caso>And unfortunately, stool is is the worst <v Dr. Ramiro Caso>contaminant of water that is not properly purified. <v Dr. Ramiro Caso>And that is available in the irrigation canals and places like that where a lot of the <v Dr. Ramiro Caso>colonia people get their water supply. <v Narrator>This environment creates some discouraging statistics. <v Narrator>Infant mortality, one hundred twenty five percent above the national <v Narrator>average. Tuberculosis, 250 percent of the national <v Narrator>average. Flu and pneumonia, 200 percent. <v Narrator>Typhus, typhoid, polio, leprosy. <v Narrator>All much more prevalent here than anywhere else in the nation. <v Narrator>Still, some people aren't convinced that it's that bad.

<v Narrator>The state's director of public health in the Valley, Dr. Paul Musgraves. <v Dr. Paul Musgraves>Well, yes, I. I think that what's been said <v Dr. Paul Musgraves>and written about the colonias has been somewhat <v Dr. Paul Musgraves>exaggerated in terms of health, which is our primary responsibility. <v Dr. Paul Musgraves>If the water these people are drinking, <v Dr. Paul Musgraves>is indeed dangerous. We aren't seeing this reflected in the incidence of <v Dr. Paul Musgraves>hepatitis and the waterborne type gastroenteritis problems that you would <v Dr. Paul Musgraves>expect to see. <v Dan Hawkins>I'm sorry, I don't want to run counter to what a public <v Dan Hawkins>health official is saying, but we see it here in the clinic. <v Dr. Paul Musgraves>We don't see it in terms of disease or do we see people who are <v Dr. Paul Musgraves>chronically malnourished. <v Dan Hawkins>They don't. They suffer from inadequate nutrition. <v Dr. Paul Musgraves>They are, for the most part, healthy people. <v Dan Hawkins>Probably among the sickest people in the state of Texas. <v Narrator>The problems of the people in the colonias have a historical basis.