Water sources and educational attainment in Colombian adults: evidence from the national nutritional survey

Academic achievement is essential to people's individual and social development by enhancing opportunities for significant personal achievement throughout life. Exposure to toxic agents due to poor water quality may negatively influence neurodevelopment in children and adolescents into adulthood.

We aimed to estimate the association between the type of water for drinking purposes and academic achievements in Colombian adults.

We designed a cross-sectional study based on the National Survey of Nutritional Situation in Colombia (Encuesta Nacional de la Situación Nutricional en Colombia -ENSIN-) 2015. Academic achievement in our study was classified as less than complete primary school (0-4 years), between complete primary and incomplete secondary (5-10 years), between complete secondary and incomplete higher education (11-15 years), and complete higher education and more (16-24 years). We utilized adjusted ordinal logistic regression to estimate betas (β's) and Odds Ratio [OR] with 95% confidence intervals [95%CI].

After adjusting for potential confounders, we report an inverse association between consumption of untreated water and academic attainments, where individuals who drink surface water [β: -0.625; 95%CI: -0.629, -0.620], or groundwater [β: -0.368; 95%CI: -0.372, -0.364] were less likely to achieve higher educational levels compared to those consuming treated water. This pattern was similar across the country when disaggregated by region.

We found that people with lower levels of education are more likely to consume untreated water in Colombia. Our results encourage improving access to treated water to the population with an emphasis on rural communities and the Atlantic region.