Four hundred residents of Cat Lake Reserve, located 150 kilometers north of Sioux Lookout, have been forced to boil drinking water on and off for over two years. Children and elders are suffering from frequent illness, most recently an outbreak of gastroenteritis. It is feared that the water is unfit for both drinking and bathing. People with private wells in the area are healthy while people on the reserve are sick. A state of emergency was recently declared when sewage backed up in a nursing station and into a water intake pipe. Reserves across Ontario are experiencing similar serious water problems and “boil-water advisories†are a way of life for some 14,000 Native people who live in northwest Ontario.
