Infectious diseases are among the leading cause of diseases and disability in Kenya. One of the leading causes of many communicable diseases is unclean or contaminated water. Contaminated drinking-water is estimated to cause more than 500 000 diarrheal deaths each year. Moreover, contaminated water can transmit diseases such as diarrhea, cholera, dysentery, typhoid and polio. Health costs associated with waterborne diseases such as malaria, diarrhea, and worm infections represent more than one third of the income of poor households in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Nowadays different methods to treat groundwater are available in rural communities ranging from filtration, distillation, solar radiation, boiling and sedimentation to administering water disinfectants to chemically purify water.

To curb effects caused by contaminated drinking water, administering water disinfectants is one of the methods used to treat groundwater in rural communities. The proposed Automatic Disinfectant Dispenser aims at automating disinfectant (water purifier) dispensation in hand pumped boreholes commonly found in rural areas. This device is meant to assist people from remote locations who largely depend on borehole water. Majority of them do not observe the water treatment procedure and our project will come in to help them in treating their drinking water.

The device is electromechanical constituting of valves, housing for water disinfectant, microcontroller, peristaltic pump and battery to power the electrical components. The device is intended for treatment of water so as to get rid of microorganisms which might act as a means of transmitting communicable diseases.