Is the tap water in Hồ Chí Minh City drinkable? All the tourist sites claim it is not, but the doctor at our training week in Canberra claimed that, with some filtering that would not be considered paranoid in Australia, the water in South-East Asian cities is drinkable. Does anyone know?
The most encouraging comment I can find is here:
Hồ Chí Minh City is one of the places that you CAN drink the tap water - thanks to the US Government, during the American War, and recent massive upgrades using Japanese technology and plastic water mains pipes.
I'd be prepared to give it a go if I can lay my hands on an active-charcoal filter (or better); the photo he showed of a mountain of used plastic water bottles was pretty disheartening.
Update: I spoke with Pat, another AYAD working on urban water quality issues somewhere around here. He claims that the tap water still contains gastro-inducing bacteria.