Illustration: Esteban Silva.
Bernardo Torres recalls that when he was a child he went to the fields and drank with his hands the water that was left after the rain in the hollows of the stones or in small puddles, just as he had often drunk well water, a tradition of South California ranching communities.
It was born after mining companies closed their operations and left San Antonio, which together with El Triunfo, were two towns that make up the oldest and most important mining district in Baja California Sur, rich in gold, silver, lead and zinc.
This past left more than 100 abandoned mining sites in the area and more than 30 debris hills, including about 600 tons of arsenolite (the mineral form of arsenic trioxide) that for every kilogram contain 700 grams of arsenic and that dissolve like a sugar cube when in contact with water. This substance flows through the streams where it filters into the Los Planes and El Carrizal basins, which provide water to the towns of San Antonio and El Triunfo, respectively.
Among the vestiges of the mining past, there is a stone's throw from a mine very close to San Antonio that is known as “Santa Cruz”. It is a vertical tunnel that, according to Bernardo, an attempt was made to exploit to extract minerals but, due to the complication of the abundance of water, it was sealed and today it is the water well used by the Municipal Operating Agency of the Drinking Water, Sewage and Sanitation System (Oomsapas) of La Paz to supply the mentioned community every three days and which reaches the population through drinking water faucets.
Zulema Lazos, general director of Oomsapas La Paz, pointed out that the population should not drink tap water and that the purpose of installing a drinking water treatment plant that treats well water is to make it suitable for human consumption, whose delivery is made to the population through a supply of water bottles.
“Tap water can't be used for drinking, but that's why they have the water treatment plant. And what is certain is that these populations have been followed up very precisely in the care of citizens,” he answered in an interview.
The Santa Cruz mine draft well exceeds the permissible arsenic concentration limit in water for human use and consumption established in NOM-127-SSA1-1994 (0.025 milligrams per liter as of 2005) and in its update published in 2022 (0.025 milligrams per liter), according to the arsenic levels provided by Oomsapas La Paz to this medium through a request for information with folio 030078224000037.
According to laboratory results, the El Carrizal 3 Well exceeded the limits allowed in July 2019 and the San Antonio Mine Shooting exceeded them in the two samplings carried out in 2020 and 2022.
Oomsapas La Paz staff confirmed that the water from the well passes through a chlorinator (chlorine gas) and is pumped into houses for domestic use, but it does not go through the reverse osmosis process, which is responsible for removing heavy metals and contaminants from the water, such as arsenic.
Bernardo is now a 70-year-old retired teacher who worries about his community, especially after learning about the effects of exposure to arsenic and fearing that this has influenced diseases and premature deaths of family and friends from cancer, diabetes and kidney failure.
“We have always been very concerned and attentive to water in San Antonio. We have asked the government to guarantee us the right and service to clean water. I have noticed and have been friends with doctors who have come here and what we have had the most was cancer of the stomach, breast, womb and colon; there is also a lot of hypertension and diabetes here. My father died of stomach cancer, my wife and daughter died of diabetes and kidney failure aged 57 and 41. And I have noticed that lately there have been a lot of problems with the gallbladder, kidneys, pancreas, and most people have allergies,” Bernardo explained.
According to the United States Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, exposure to arsenic causes visible physiological effects such as skin lesions, and others less so, such as cancer primarily of the lung, skin and bladder, and with a smaller association, liver and kidney cancers.
There may also be respiratory, renal and cardiovascular effects such as heart arrhythmias and hypertension. He even points out that there is a reasonably strong association with diabetes mellitus, but there is limited evidence to prove it.
Antonia Valdéz is a resident of San Antonio and is waiting to be scheduled for gallstone surgery at a hospital in La Paz, since in San Antonio there is only one Health Center of the Ministry of Health of Baja California Sur that provides basic care. Every two months he travels to the capital city for his scheduled appointment or, sometimes, sooner because he can't stand the pain.
“We know that the water is a little contaminated. Sometimes we think that this may be the reason why so many people are getting sick with the gallbladder, because of what it contains, but there is no certainty to say if it is or not,” Antonia said.
In addition, in San Antonio there are about 4,105 meters of 2-inch asbestos pipe, according to a diagnosis made by Oomsapas La Paz in 2013 and delivered through transparency. This material has been classified as toxic and carcinogenic by the World Health Organization.
In the last five years, the drinking water well in San Antonio has only been rehabilitated once, for which Oomsapas La Paz had a budget of 248,902 pesos from the Municipal Social Infrastructure Fund (FISM), according to a request for information.
Therefore, in addition to arsenic contamination, another concern of the community is the condition of the infrastructure of the well that is currently located on a property. It is surrounded by a cyclonic mesh fence with two doors that are connected by a wire and that does not prevent the entry of personnel outside the Oomsapas. It has a powdery and rusty lid that covers only a third of the well, while the rest is exposed to the environment. And the tubes that pump and carry water are rusting and resting on pieces of old wood.
“All the animals are looking for water and there (in the well) there are animals that live like rats, cockroaches, lizards, in short. A lot of animals that are housed and that can contribute to diseases,” said Bernardo.
Oomsapas La Paz exercised 23 thousand 341.72 pesos to maintain drinking water works from 2019 to March 2024, which corresponds to 3,890 pesos per year.
As for well maintenance, he spent 511,623.80 pesos in the same period.
The budget was not exercised every year. From 2020 to 2022, Oomsapas did not spend resources to maintain drinking water works and, for its part, in 2020 and 2023, no recourse was exercised for well maintenance.
From 2020 to October 2023, of the total expenditure exercised, Oomsapas spent 23.03% on the general services chapter where, among other services, the maintenance of drinking water and sewerage works, wells and wastewater plants are located.
Until a few years ago, the community advocated that the current well be maintained, however, what they are asking for is the drilling of a new well.
“We have proposed to Conagua and Oomsapas La Paz the relocation of the system, to drill a hole exclusively for water, higher and that is not located in a mine shot or in a mine; outside the area where it is currently located,” Bernardo said.
When questioning the director of Oomsapas La Paz about the concerns of the population, she commented that she has only received complaints in San Antonio that the water does not reach the upper part, which were addressed by modifying the network so that it arrived with better pressure.
Purification impacts our pocketbooks
The San Antonio water treatment plant was installed in 1997 and rehabilitated in 2013 with the intention of providing useful water for consumption (drinking and cooking) that does not pose a risk to the health of the community, according to the general director of Oomsapas La Paz.
“The plant was built precisely, because very close by there are gunshots and there were mines, and to avoid contamination of the population by any element that is too much and could be harmful to health. These plants are used to make water for domestic use, for human beings and that does not affect their health. They are plants that have a lifespan, that are in good condition, they are purifying in the best way and the water they purify is under the norm, none of them have arsenic,” Lazos explained.
Oomsapas La Paz, through its director, noted that periodic water samples are taken from drinking water every four months and are sent to a certified laboratory to be sure that they meet the standard.
According to the analytical results provided to Causa Natura Media by Oomsapas La Paz through transparency, in monthly samples from January 2023 to March 2024, arsenic levels are below the NOM, making it suitable for human consumption.
The San Antonio water treatment plant produces an annual volume of 275 cubic meters per year, which are delivered to the community in the form of a supply of two 19-liter bottles per person per day.
However, because the water it treats comes from the Santa Cruz mine, residents distrust that it is suitable for human consumption and, since they do not have access to the analytical results of drinking water, they prefer to implement the precautionary principle of supplying themselves from other sources.
“In the beginning, when the water treatment plant was made, I saw that pipes were coming to put water there... right now I haven't seen it and I think they're throwing it away and it doesn't give us confidence that they'll take it from there because we know it's shocked,” Bernardo said.
The majority of the town follows the same protocol as Bernardo. He pays approximately 260 pesos for the water bill and with tap water he irrigates his plants, gives his animals something to drink and to bathe. He goes to La Paz weekly to buy 10 to 14 bottles of drinking water that cost around 140 pesos, which he uses for drinking and cooking. Buy a water pipe that comes from the community of Los Planes for 1,500 pesos with 10,000 liters of water that you use to wash dishes, rinse fruits and vegetables and bathe.
“Every month I spend approximately 2,500 pesos of water, that's normal, it has to be spent. There are a lot of protocols and a lot of expense, but if you go to homes and ask where they get water from, they'll tell you that it's from La Paz,” Bernardo explained.
Assess the real risk of the population
In 2014, Janette Murillo, a researcher specializing in marine geology for the National Polytechnic Institute (IPN) published an article showing the finding of urinary arsenic concentrations from 0.001 to 0.39 milligrams per liter in the inhabitants of the hydrological basins of San Juan de Los Planes and El Carrizal.
NOM-047-SSA1-2011 states that the Biological Exposure Index (IBE) of arsenic in urine is 0.035 milligrams per liter, therefore, values higher than this indicate that people are being exposed to concentrations that are toxic to the body.
The inhabitants of San Antonio had the highest average concentration per town at 0.064 mg/L, twice the IBE, and identified a high correlation with the type of water they consumed, since the highest values were those who drank well water, followed by tap water and, at the end, purified water.
In an interview with Causa Natura Media, Murillo pointed out that in the villages there are still people who drink water from wells and the population is exposed to other sources of arsenic, so the population should be given urine tests to assess the risk ten years after his study.
“You have to consider that not all ranchers are available to go to the plant that supplies the water. Then it would be necessary to do a study of who cooks and drinks the plant's water and of those who cook with the water from the well or the faucet. In addition, dust is contributing to exposure to arsenic; if they don't wash what they eat well and it has dust with arsenolite there too, it's adding to it; and if they irrigate with that water, there are plants that retain arsenic in the roots, in the leaves, or it can be in the soil itself. So there are several routes of exposure. I think that when these people at least found out (through urinalysis) and they were more aware and that should have reduced the levels, but they would have to be re-analyzed,” Murillo said.
Bernardo knows that he can never drink water straight from the well or the ground again, but he is content to have the peace of mind that the water he receives from Oomsapas La Paz through the purifier and in the household faucets respects Mexican regulations to stop spending so much money and not feeling that every contact with water reduces the health of him and his community.
*This is the third report in series #RedEnAbandono, a special about the damage to hydraulic infrastructure and its consequences in Mexico. Originally published in Causa Natura Media.
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