U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion

Increase the proportion of people whose water supply meets Safe Drinking Water Act regulations — EH‑03 Data Methodology and Measurement

On this page:  About the National Data  |  Methodology  |  History

About the National Data

Data

Data Source:  Safe Drinking Water Information System (SDWIS), EPA/OW

Baseline: 90.2 percent of persons served by community water systems received a supply of drinking water that met the regulations of the Safe Drinking Water Act in 2018

Target: 92.1 percent

Numerator
Number of persons served by community water supply utilities that do not have violations of the Safe Drinking Water Act Regulation.
Denominator
Number of persons served by community water supplies.
Target-setting method
Projection
Target-setting method details
Linear trend fitted using ordinary least squares and a projection at the 25 percent prediction interval.
1
Target-setting method justification
Trend data were evaluated for this objective. Using historical data points, a trend line was fitted using ordinary least squares, and the trend was projected into the next decade. This method was used because three or more comparable data points were available, the projected value was within the range of possible values, and a projection at the 25 percent prediction interval was selected because there has been a steady but gradual increase in the number of community water systems meeting the Safe Drinking Water Information System 2008.

Methodology

Methodology notes
Violation information for each public water system, including whether the system has:
  • failed to follow established monitoring and reporting schedules
  • failed to comply with mandated treatment techniques
  • violated any Maximum Contaminant Levels (MCLs)
  • failed to communicate required information to their customers

History

Comparable HP2020 objective
Modified, which includes core objectives that are continuing from Healthy People 2020 but underwent a change in measurement.
Changes between HP2020 and HP2030
This objective differs from Healthy People 2020 objective EH-4 in that, although the objective statement has not changed, the methodology and software for tracking the objective have been revised.

1. Because Healthy People 2030 objectives have a desired direction (e.g., increase or decrease), the confidence level of a one-sided prediction interval can be used as an indication of how likely a target will be to achieve based on the historical data and fitted trend.