The association between water quality and diarrhea varied by quantity of water available to the household. Increasing the availability in the house by having a household connection and a storage facility is the most important factor associated with reduced diarrhea in this area.

No association was found between diarrhea and bacteriological drinking water quality in the public water sources while the association with quality in domestic storage containers was stronger although not statistically significant. Faecal contamination was generally high in the domestic storage even when the source of water was of good quality. Under such conditions it is questionable whether public water treatment alone will have a significant impact on the incidence of endemic childhood diarrhea. WHO guidelines for zero faecal contamination at the public water source is too restrictive in rural communities as it is not feasible in practice and may not have an impact unless domestic domain faecal contamination is prevented.

An intervention of introducing narrow necked pitchers, to replace the wide-necked ones in use, for domestic water storage was capable of reducing in-house contamination in domestic storage. It was therefore proposed that future drinking water projects in developing countries could promote culturally acceptable in-house storage containers that reduced the domestic transmission of faecal-oral pathogens.