Bathing on the north coast of Rio Grande do Sul from 2007 to 2017

Abstract

The North Coast of Rio Grande do Sul has an extensive, continuous sandy beach, with extremely fragile environments and rich in biodiversity, consisting of eight coastal municipalities: Torres, Arroio do Sal, Capão da Canoa, Xangri-lá, Imbé, Tramandaí, Cidreira and Balneário Pinhal. The objective of this work was to develop a diagnosis of bathing in 22 points of the North Coast/RS in 2196 weeks, based on public data from FEPAM between the years 2007 and 2017. Only six weeks had improper bathing, with >2500 thermotolerant coliforms/100 ml, mainly in 2012/2011 and 2014/2013 and in the first weeks of January and February. Additionally, 72 weeks were >1000 thermotolerant coliforms/100 mL. Despite having the best sanitary infrastructure on the North Coast, Torres was the municipality that most presented critical and/or inappropriate weeks. The Magistério beach in the municipality of Balneário Pinhal had the highest value of thermotolerant coliforms, 7000 NMP/100mL, in 2014/2013. Then 5400 NMP/100mL on the beaches of Tramandaí and Arroio do Sal in 2014/2013. The value of 4900 NMP/100mL was found in the analysis carried out on the beach of Costa do Sol in the municipality of Cidreira in 2014/2013. In Prainha, the city of Torres, values ​​of 5400 MPN/100mL and 3500 MPN/100mL were also found in 2015/2014 and 2014/2013, respectively. Therefore, it can be concluded that the North Coast/RS has an excellent environmental quality, even with a precarious basic sanitation structure, with few critical and/or inappropriate weeks for bathing in the period from 2007 to 2017.