Even as a controversy is raging about the quality of water filters being sold in the country, a senior official of the Qatar General Organisation for Standards and Metrology has said that water filters available in the local market do not pose any heath hazard. Dr Mohammed Saif Al Kuwari, general manager of the organisation, was responding to reports in a section of the local media about concerns raised by an expert panel at the Central Municipal Council (CMC) about the quality of the water filters. The General Services Committee at CMC had warned against the harmful effects of some water filters, saying that they could remove even useful minerals from drinking water. Al Kuwari told Al Sharq that all water filters being sold in Qatar met WHO standards. He, however, said a special filter used by pharmacies for removing salt from water was not advisable for filtering drinking water. A senior official of the Environmental Health Section at the National Health Authority (Ministry of Health), in an interview with The Peninsula several months ago, had said some companies here were promoting expensive reverse osmosis filters, claiming they would remove salt from desalinated water. Such filters were being offered for sale to the public. He said that the content of salt in tap water in Qatar was normal and such filters were not required for removing the sediments. He had also warned that such filters could themselves become a source of contamination if not maintained properly. http://thepeninsulaqatar.com/Display_news.asp?section=Local%5FNews&subsection=Qatar+News&month=January2009&file=Local_News2009012222158.xml

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