Drinking Water

Females and Males

Male respondents across the board are more likely to view their water as safe than females are—90 vs. 79 percent among the general population, and 80 vs. 71 percent among college students. These results are consistent with the 2012 Iowa Learning Farms Community Assessments, where male respondents and those engaged in farming had higher perceptions of the safety of their drinking water.

Is your home drinking water safe to drink?

General Public and Students

Nearly 87 percent of general public respondents view their home drinking water as safe. Note that half of the respondents in this group are on well water. The Iowa Rural Drinking Water Survey (Lade, Comito, Benning, Kaiser, and Kling, 2022) found that well water users generally believe their wells are safe—but that only 9 percent had tested the water from the well in the previous year, and most likely responded based on their assumptions rather than on test results.

Among college students, the perception of safe drinking water seems to be influenced by which campus the respondent attends. While nearly 74 percent of the overall student respondents view their home drinking water as safe, the individual percentages change depending on the university they attend.

This may be affected by where each university sits in the watershed and the proximity of a river to campus. Iowa State University (ISU) is nearer the headwaters of the watershed, but the river is almost invisible to students day to day. The University of Northern Iowa (UNI) is located in the middle of the watershed and the river is a couple of miles away. The University of Iowa (UI) rests in the bottom of the watershed and no one can miss the Iowa River as it bisects the UI campus.

Farmers and Non-Farmers

Of those engaged in farming, 90 percent of the general public and 89 percent of students view their water as safe to drink. Among those not engaged in farming, 83 percent of the general public respondents and 72 percent of students view their water as safe.