Canadian Drinking Water Guidelines Development Process

1. Introduction

The Guidelines for Canadian Drinking Water Quality, published by Health Canada, provide a comprehensive set of drinking water quality guidelines that are scientifically defensible. The Guidelines address micro-biological, chemical, physical and radiological parameters relevant to drinking water quality issues in Canada.

In 1983, a working group under the Federal-Provincial-Territorial Committee on Environmental and Occupational Health (CEOH) began updating the 1978 edition of the Guidelines for Canadian Drinking Water Quality. In 1986, this working group was changed to a standing subcommittee, the Federal-Provincial Subcommittee on Drinking Water (DWS) (see Annex 1 for Operating Rules). Since then, DWS has been developing new, and revising existing, drinking water guidelines. Members of DWS include representatives of federal and provincial¹ departments of health and environment. The Secretariat for DWS is provided by Health Canada -specifically, the Drinking Water Section of the Safe Environments Directorate (Healthy Environments and Consumer Safety Branch).

In May 1993, CEOH directed DWS to document the process it uses to develop these guidelines - specifically, the steps of identification, assessment, evaluation, decision-making and approval, announcement and publication and re-evaluation (see Figure 1) - while stressing the importance of communication among DWS, CEOH and the public at all stages of the process.

Throughout the entire guideline development process, DWS uses the criteria outlined in the publication, "Strategies for Population Health - Investing in the Health of Canadians" (prepared by the Federal, Provincial and Territorial Advisory Committee on Population Health for the Meeting of the Ministers of Health, September 14-15, 1994). These criteria cover the issues of national significance, impact, common directions, capacity, return on investment and flexibility.

The following sections contain a brief description of the steps involved in developing a Canadian drinking water guideline using a hypothetical Substance X for illustrative purposes. It must be stressed that the development of Canadian drinking water guidelines relies on a flexible process that must accommodate the diverse needs of various jurisdictions. Certain of the steps described below may be modified or circumvented in order to address the needs of the jurisdictions involved.

Figure 1 Canadian Drinking Water Guidelines Development Process

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1. The term "provinces" ("provincial") as used throughout this document should be taken to include "territories" ("territorial").