News

Innovative water purifier available soon

17 August 2010

A tea bag-sized filter that cleans highly polluted water and costs about three cents per litre to use could be available to the public in approximately six weeks, the University of Stellenbosch said on Monday.

Professor Eugene Cloete, the dean of the faculty of science at the university, said the filter could help meet the needs of people who lived in remote areas or whose regular water supply was not being treated to potable standards.

“The lack of availability of adequate, safe and affordable water supplies impacts severely on vulnerable groups such as the poor, the elderly, HIV/Aids patients and children,” he said.

“More than 90% of all cholera cases are reported in Africa, and 300 million people on our continent do not have access to safe drinking water. Clearly, something has to be done about this,” he said.

The filters are made with the same materials as rooibos tea bags, and are disposable, portable, easy to use and environmentally friendly.

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