DENVER—It could be three weeks before Alamosa residents can drink water straight from the tap after an outbreak of dozens of cases of salmonella traced to municipal water.
Gov. Bill Ritter declared an emergency Friday in Alamosa County, which activates the Colorado National Guard and provides up to $300,000 for emergency response efforts.
The city and county already had declared emergencies as officials scrambled to provide residents with safe water and disinfect the water system with chlorine.
The earliest the city could begin flushing the water system is Tuesday, and disinfecting it and making sure it is safe could take several days, James Martin, executive director of the state health department said Friday.
Officials say it could take a total of three weeks before the system can be used.
Water agencies from Denver, Aurora and Fort Collins were assisting.
Ned Calonge, chief medical officer for the state health department, said an epidemiologic analysis indicates the municipal water system is the source of the rare outbreak.
As of Friday, 138 cases of salmonella linked to the outbreak had been reported in people from infancy to age 89. Of those, 47 were confirmed by lab testing, and seven of them have been hospitalized, Calonge said.
Alamosa, a southern Colorado town with about 8,500 residents, gets its water from a deep well system and is not chlorinated.
Health officials say boiling the tap water will kill the bacteria to make it safe for use, but they warned no one should use even boiled tap water once the flush of the water system begins.
Pet owners were warned not to give animals contaminated tap water either.
San Luis Valley Regional Medical Center in Alamosa turned off its water fountains and bought bottled water, Chief Operating Officer Henry Garvin said.
A storage unit of potable water was brought in so staff could wash dishes, and equipment was being sanitized with alcohol, he said.
“It’s becoming much more costly to deliver care, but for patient care it’s not going to be an issue,” Garvin said. He did not have an immediate estimate of extra costs.
City Market was supplying 75 gallons of water a day to San Luis Care Center, and the nursing home was using paper dishes for meals for its 63 residents, administrator Mikel Barr said.
About 45 businesses, from grocery stores to brewers, were providing enough bottled water to supply residents for several days, in some cases for free, for drinking, brushing teeth, washing dishes, making ice, cooking and making baby formula, said Hans Kallam, director of the state Division of Emergency Management.
Bulk water was also available from nearby East Alamosa, which is not connected to the city system.
Residents may at times have to buy their own bottled water, but anyone who needs help will get it, state officials said.
“No one’s going to go without water in Alamosa during this emergency,” Martin said.
State officials were still seeking donations of disposable plates and utensils and hand sanitizers.
Investigators were trying to determine how the water system was contaminated. Possibilities include a compromise in a storage tank or cross-contamination with a sewage line, Calonge said.
City Councilwoman April Gonzales said the city had planned to start treating city water this summer, but the salmonella outbreak sped up the city’s timetable.
Salmonella is typically spread by food though there have been a few cases of the bacteria in water leading to outbreaks.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said only 15 salmonella outbreaks from public water systems were reported from 1971 to 2004.
Symptoms include diarrhea, fever and stomach cramps that usually go away within a week, although same cases may require hospitalization.
Restaurants were told to toss produce washed with city water if the food was going to be served raw, and not to use city water to wash dishes or to make ice or soda fountain drinks.
