Most of the 43 million Americans who rely on private wells don’t know if their water is safe to drink because unlike the regulation of public water systems, there is no government monitoring of wells … In areas where proper wastewater treatment is rare, regulation is not enforced “because a lot of people just can’t afford to get a system that works,” said Mark Elliott, a civil engineer and researcher at the University of Alabama. In the South in particular, he added, “Many of them are living in conditions similar to before outhouses came in 120 years ago.”