By Lara Fominoff @LaraFominoff on Twitter

Fecal contamination incidents continue to plague Henderson Pool

Jul 20, 2018 | 1:54 PM

LETHBRIDGE – It’s still happening. Two weeks after Henderson Pool Managers said they were trying to stop the large number of fecal contamination incidents from occurring, officials say staff are still dealing with them far too frequently.

And the concern is not only that summer staff lose their hours because they’re being sent home, not only that it costs thousands of dollars each time a 24-hour closure needs to occur, not only that people lose the swim time they have paid for – but that serious gastrointestinal parasites like Cryptosporidium may infect the public and could see the popular outdoor pool shut down for weeks.

Brad Pack is the General Manager with Recreational Excellence for the City of Lethbridge. He says they’ve now run out of plastic pants for babies and small children, and they’re hoping that a continued educational awareness program will mitigate the number of contaminations that occur.

“All of our staff right now are currently educating the public. We have pamphlets at the front. When we do grounds checks at this particular pool, we go around and they talk to parents of kids and just say take regular bathroom breaks. Often kids get excited to be here and when kids get excited, they don’t want to take a break sometimes, and so it’s good to make them take a break and take them to the washroom on regular times.”

So far, there has been one 24 closure this year, and there were several last year. However, shorter closures anywhere from 30 minutes and longer occur commonly. They also happen at other pools in the city, but because of the popularity of Henderson Pool and the number of people who use the facility, it happens much more often – sometimes more than once a day.

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Dr. Vivian Suttorp, with Alberta Health says summer is “the season” for increased fecal-related parasite or disease incidents like Cryptosporidium, and they can occur quickly in areas like pools.

“We have had a Crypto situation in Lethbridge a couple of years ago where there was a pool closed and there were a lot of measures that had to be taken. Entire cleaning and decontamination of a pool, a pool being out of service for months.”

She says that’s not the situation at this point, but she adds that the seriousness of fecal contamination and its potential effects on those using the pool and even secondary infections, is something everyone using recreational pools should be conscious of.

Suttorp also explains that there’s a time delay and a “kill factor” before chlorine can actually kill organisms and the filters pick it up. That’s when people are exposed to viruses and parasites, and when they can get sick. There can be up to one billion organisms in just one bowel movement.

For cryptosporidium, it can take anywhere from two days to nearly two weeks for the illness to appear. Symptoms can include watery diahhrea, fever, vomiting, weight loss and stomach cramps. More serious infections can even require hospitalization.