Tap Water in PP Unclean - How True is It?

Hi Anthony,

I cannot be 100% sure, but my daughter has lived in PP for 12 years, and has always understood that drinking the tap water there is one of the surest ways to get a serious stomach upset.
Also it is advised not to accept broken ice from a large ice block, as there is no way to know where the water came from to make it. Only accept preformed ice cubes in drinks, as this is usually from a clean source.
My daughter drinks filtered tap water at home in PP, and has not suffered any ill effects so far.

Hope this helps.
Reg

I've heard that the tap water in the city is apparently safe but i still wouldn't intentionally drink it. i brush my teeth with tap water, which is fine, and i assume that my cooks use tap water with meals. boiling water helps get rid of bacteria also.

Hi guys, thanks for your feedback. Well it seems the tap water is indeed not clean enough. Well, guess I'll stick with using mineral water then - mineral water's cheap here anyway.

I have heard that the actual water is very clean but the problem is the rusty/dirty pipes and tanks the water has to pass through.

Anyway having said that,a few months ago I found out that my close friend and her family have been drinking tap water for the 4 and a half years they have lived in PP!!!They are still alive btw if you are wondering And also each time i have visited them since ive known them(more than 2 yrs now) I obviously drank the water they offered me not knowing it was tap water and I didn't have any issues-stomach updets,pain etc etc.Well since I found out it was tap water I def avoid drinking it now...

I still wont knowingly drink tap water here..but the block ice thing i donno..they use that in almost everything.In the iced coffees,the  sugarcane juice...etc etc i donno.It would be hard to completely avoid it.

Really? Do you know if your friend's family boils the water before they drink it? Are they Khmer?

Myself, I've once boiled tap water and used it to make hot chocolate, and it wasn't until I drank it and found it to taste a little odd that I realized what I did. Still, it made no sense to waste it, so I drank it up anyhow. Nothing happened.

Though I still agree that drinking tap water knowingly is probably not such a good idea. Once in a while I guess it's fine - drink it often, and you won't know what it's gonna do to you.

haha I know what you mean with the boiled water tasting...odd.I have been served that as well in my khmer friend's house lol.

Ok,the friends am talking about who have been drinking tap water for 4 years now dont boil it.They get it straight from the tap,put it in the fridge to chill and just drink it cold.Even warm straight from the tap!!I have talked to them about it and their response is pretty much if the water was that bad it would have affected them years ago when they started drinking it..oh well I guess ill wait and see ay?Oh and they are African like me,not Khmer

I lived in PP between 2000 and 2010, the tap water was supposed to be the best quality in the region, I worked on some projects that produced equipment for water testing at the treatment works.

I had always used tap water for tea and coffee after boiling, but straight from the tap for teeth brushing, no problems even when in other parts of the coutry.

The bottled water has issues too, a Dutch business volunteer did some work at one of the larger bottled water companies, he noticed that when the big 20 litre bottles come back they are just refilled, not washed or sterilised. These are never tested either, they only batch test the .5 litre bottles.   

Best wishes

'In the region'? You mean in Cambodia?

Yes, I suspect boiling tap water should be good enough, once I have enough of buying bottled water I probably will switch to tap water.

Your note on bottled water is a little worrying though. But I guess there's nothing we can do about that kind of thing huh.

By region I meant SE Asia, the Japanese installed the water purification system in the 1990s, and the water mains in PP were being replaced up until about 2002-3. I can't say if water quality has been maintained since the mid 2000 though.

Don't drink the tap water. It causes more than just stomach pain.
I recommend you buy a water filter to connect to your tap. We got ours at Sun Hour on Monivong.

JanKrohn wrote:

I recommend you buy a water filter to connect to your tap. We got ours at Sun Hour on Monivong.

That's something I haven't thought of yet - thanks for the suggestion.

Hello! Just wanted to chime in and share my experience. I've lived here for about four months now, and I've been drinking water for three of those months. The first month, I bought bottled water to let my stomach get used to the food first, and then I slowly started drinking a bit of tap water to test it out, and I didn't have any problems.
Bottled water is cheap here, but when you plan on living here for a year on an ESL Teacher's salary, the expense can start to seem too large very quickly.
I haven't had any probs at all, but you'll have to decide for yourself

I think it depends on the pipeline as well. I doubt it is the best in the SE Asia, maybe among the better one installed. Does it comes with chlorine added to it? Just send for lab test if one is particularly concern. Yup, I do find some bottled water seems to be filled with particles too. Anyway the local told me that that's the difference between 'mineral' water and 'distilled' water or 'pure' water. 'Distilled and pure' water are zero mineral.

you'd  better equip with a ceremic water filter, then you can drink cook safe for sure.while water filter 's more cheaper in vietnam border, you'd better purchase one from german METRO in long xuyen(vietnam border city),or co-op mart there,

Been doing some research (that's how I came across this post) and decided to give it a try. For one month now, we use tap water for every need. All three of us (of which two barangs) are (still) in perfect health, and I drink 3 liters of it per day.
Tip: I fill the big bottle with water from the tap late in the evening, to avoid the water that's been heating up in the pipes during the daytime.