Alongside scientific knowledge of hazards that may contaminate water sources, those living and working in rural sub-Saharan Africa may have detailed knowledge of potential contamination hazards and where they are located. Participatory mapping has been used as a component of the OneHealthWater project which aims to draw on that knowledge, to better understand geographic patterns of hazards that could contaminate water sources. The technique in this study involves working with small groups or individuals in 10 villages in Siaya County, who are then asked to map the domestic water sources and possible microbiological contamination hazards onto satellite imagery. The outputs may contribute to a better understanding of the potential hazards that may be found around rural water sources in sub-Saharan Africa and ultimately help to improve management of water safety.Diarrhoeal disease and lack of access to safe water remain significant public health issues in developing countries. There is also growing concern about the potential for disease, including diarrhoeal infections, to be transmitted from livestock to humans. This project addresses the potential drinking-water contamination risks to human health in rural sub-Saharan Africa, where people and livestock often live in close proximity. Preliminary fieldwork will be carried out in rural Kenya, building on an ongoing study that is simultaneously recording human and livestock disease in ten villages. The fieldwork will test different techniques to identify contamination hazards from livestock, alongside water quality testing and recording of diarrhoea in children. These techniques will include the use of GPS collars to track cattle movements, maps of hazardous areas created by the communities themselves, and also checklists for recording signs of livestock hazards at water sources and around water stored in the home. We will look at how feasible it is to record hazards using these techniques. We will also statistically assess whether we find greater water contamination and greater diarrhoea in children where there are more recorded hazards. Since measurement of water contamination used in such areas is based on bacteria found in both livestock and humans, the project will also work on affordable ways of testing for micro-organisms that are specifically found in livestock faeces versus those found in human faeces. If successful, such techniques could be used to investigate the importance of different sources of faecal contamination of drinking-water. This in turn could help manage the safety of rural water sources like wells and rainwater and better protect drinking-water stored in the home from contamination through livestock. Because this complex problem requires a wide range of expertise, during the project we will strength our academic team to include more disciplines, particularly specialists in child health and social sciences. The tools for identifying hazards from livestock will be made widely available at the end of the project and UK expertise in the microbiological laboratory techniques will be shared with Kenyan collaborators. The experience gained will be used to build up contacts and develop a plan and team for a larger-scale study of livestock hazards, water contamination, and diarrhoeal disease risk in several countries.

Criteria for selection of participants was developed to ensure that only participants that would most effectively meet the objectives of the exercise were invited. This targeted members of the community who were known to be knowledgeable, had interacted with the environment of the neighborhood at a mature level for a minimum of 10 years and were literate enough to conceptualize and establish the locations and spatial distribution of the water sources and contamination hazards, as well as people engaged in water and livestock management in the households.Both purposive referral and randomized probability sampling approaches were employed in the selecting the participants to be involved in the mapping exercise. The Village reporters and guides, with the support of chiefs and village elders, proposed a list of at least 30 people from each of the villages who met the criteria. At least three female and three male key informants were also identified from each village making a total of 36 proposed participants per village. Out of the initial frame of 36 people (referral sample), 12-18 participants were randomly selected for the participatory mapping exercise depending on the size of each of the villages. A series of sensitization and community mobilization visits to the villages were carried out in order to make personal contacts with the participants, seek informed consent and invite them to the meetings. Participants were facilitated to identify, discuss and list the different types of the water sources, the uses of each of the water sources, ranking of the water sources in terms of their safety drinking and all the hazards in the village that could contaminate them. They were asked to list and rank all the waters sources in their neighbourhoods and in entire villages. They were then asked to identify and list all the hazards that they thought could potentially contaminate or actually contaminates the water sources. Using the knowledge built up from the experiential and interactive discussions above, participants were exposed to a high spatial resolution WorldView2 image map of the each of the villages. Once participants were familiar with the image maps, 5-7 people that they considered knowledgeable from the larger group were elected to undertake the mapping exercise. Transparencies were overlaid on each map and ground control points were marked. The groups were then provided with coloured pens and asked to identify locations on the hard copy image maps where the listed water sources, as well as contamination hazards were found in the surrounding landscape. As they progressed with the task with the larger group as observers, each of the groups discussed and agreed on each water source’s or hazard’s location in relation to the various topographic features that they could identify on the image map before its location was finally marked on the transparency. Upon completion of the tasks, the resultant hard copy maps were cartographically processed by scanning and georeferencing them using the earlier established ground control points.