[The virological supervision of drinking water quality--a review]

Drinking-water must be free of pathogenic organisms; this challenge refers to pathogenic viruses too. In order to control virological aspects of water quality realistic and practicable monitoring procedures, esp. practical microbial assays, must be performed. They should include in all cases standard plate counts and counts of total or faecal coliform bacteria. Counts of coliphages in combination with standard plate counts and counts of coliform bacteria offer a practical and reliable indicator system for evaluating the virological safety of treated drinking-water supplies in the case of drinking-water reclaimed from contaminated raw water, esp. surface water.