R. ADAMS

Water covers 71% of the earth surface and is essential for all the living beings. Nearly all metabolic processes take place in the presence of water. Clean water has a number of health benefits which include enhancing appetite control, metabolism, increase energy levels and aid in heart rate. Microorganisms are a crucial component of water. They are not only in charge of nutrient cycling, but they can also contribute to a number of diseases that are water-borne. In this study, the prevalence of pathogenic bacteria and fungi in water samples from two major distributors in Ugbowo, Benin City, Nigeria was evaluated. Six bacteria genera in total were isolated from both water samples namely, Proteus sp, Salmonella sp, Shigella sonnei, Enterobacter sp, Pseudomonas
sp and Escherichia coli all of which are known to cause unpleasant human diseases when consumed in large quantities. The fungal isolates obtained from both water samples sin this study were, Mucor sp, Penicillium citrinum, Penicilium oxalicum, and aflatoxigenic Aspergillus fumigatus. The total heterotrophic bacteria counts obtained from the distribution companies ranged
from 4.70x104±5.60 CFU/ml to 7.85 x104±2.80 CFU/ml. The fungal counts obtained also ranged from 2.24x104±2.82 CFU/ml to 3.00x104±1.41 CFU/ml. It was also observed in this study that the isolated bacteria demonstrated resistance to some of the antibiotics in the antibacterial susceptibility testing, suggesting the presence of multi drug resistant strains. Studies should be
conducted to test the efficacy of alternative antimicrobial agents to human pathogenic bacteria and fungi