In Coral Harbour, overcrowded homes run out of water

More than half of the people interviewed for a new study in Coral Harbour say they run out of water at least once a month.

And theres one thingmost of those homes have in common theyrehousing more people than they were built for.

"A house, let's say, that was typically designed for four or five people, the houses that instead had anywhere from five- to nine-plus people, seemed to be those who were reporting water shortages, saidKiley Daley, a graduate student at Dalhousie university who was the lead author ofthe recently published exploratory study.

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The research project, published in the International Journal of Circumpolar Health, looked at 28 households in the hamlet, where water is trucked to homes. The research article says"the Territory of Nunavut faces serious overcrowding issues" and a problem with "hidden homeless,"who live temporarily in other peoples' homes.

People interviewed for the study said the water shortages sometimes affected whether they could bathe their childrenor wash their clothes.

Daley saidthe study estimated how much water each resident uses.

While he has no immediate plans to conduct further research on the subject,he suggests a future study could track water shipments and measure water usage.

He saidpeople in Coral Harbour approached him to do the study, while a group of researchers was looking at other issues related to water quality in the hamlet.