Village of Roche Percee under Emergency Boil Water Advisory

The village of Roche Percee was placed under an Emergency Boil Water Advisory on Thursday after E. coli was found in the drinking water system.

Roche Percee is about 20 kilometres southeast of Estevan.

According to a letter sent from the Saskatchewan Health Authority to the village’s mayor and council, the dangerous bacteria was detected in a sample collected on Monday.

“Because the presence of E. coli presents a serious threat to health, provincial protocol requires that an Emergency Boil Water Order be issued when it is found in a public water supply,” read the letter.

For those using water from the system, it needs to be held at a rolling boil for at least one minute before using. That applies to any water that might enter a person’s mouth, including water used for tooth brushing and soaking false teeth and water used in cooking and drinking which won’t then be heated.

Ice cubes should also be made from water that was previously boiled.

All utensils should also be soaked in a solution of 10 millilitres of bleach for every litre of water for at least two minutes after being washed to kill any bacteria.

The health authority warns people not to mix bleach with household cleaners.

According to the provincial government, a precautionary boil water advisory was issued for the Roche Percee Waterworks on Aug. 23 because the treatment process couldn’t keep up with a deterioration on the quality of the source water and there was an unacceptable particle count in the treated water.