Poland has come out worst in the European Union. This is terrible news before the summer holidays
Polish bathing areas ranked last among EU countries in terms of bathing water quality, according to a report by the European Environment Agency (EEA) for 2024 published on Thursday. The best results were achieved by Cyprus, Bulgaria and Greece.
Of the 764 bathing areas located in Poland , 58.1% met the highest EU standards of "excellent" water quality. 13% of bathing areas were classified as "good", 6% as "sufficient", and 2.6% were assessed as "poor" quality . For 20.3% of bathing areas, no category was assigned - most often due to lack of sufficient data.
Poland fared poorly against the background of the entire European Union. Only Albania, which was also included in the report, fared worse in the ranking. The EU average of bathing areas with "excellent" water quality was 85.4%.
In these countries, bathing water is of the best qualityThe best results were achieved by: Cyprus (99.2% of bathing areas with excellent water quality), Bulgaria (97.9%) and Greece (97%). The weakest - apart from Poland - were Estonia (61.5%), Hungary (67%) and Belgium (69.2%).
Lake in Cyprus/photo: Unsplash HongbinIn Poland, the best quality of bathing waters was recorded in the Pomeranian and Wielkopolska provinces , where almost all bathing areas were rated "excellent". The Łódź province fared the worst - in 17% of the bathing areas there, poor quality water was detected.
The report notes that the quality of bathing waters in Europe has improved significantly in recent decades thanks to reduced discharges of untreated municipal sewage, investments in treatment plants and systematic monitoring under the 2006 EU Bathing Water Directive.
Bathing waters were analysed for two types of bacteria – E. coli and enterococci – which are indicators of pollution from municipal sewage and manure. The study does not take into account chemical contaminants such as pesticides, heavy metals or microplastics.
