The U.S. federal government has "consistently" overlooked massive amounts of waterway contamination stemming from 271 million pounds of pharmaceuticals legally released into waterways, the Associated Press reported today.
According to the news agency's investigation, government and industry officials don't know how many pharmaceutical ingredients – like lithium and nitroglycerin – are released into lakes and rivers that feed into drinking water, because they don't track those chemicals as drugs.
But the AP found that 22 pharmaceutical compounds do show up in EPA and Food and Drug Administration records. Drugmakers and federal regulators both say that the manufacturing of these kinds of chemicals doesn't impact water quality, but according to the story...
...researchers say the lack of required testing amounts to a 'don't ask, don't tell' policy about whether drugmakers are contributing to water pollution.
"It doesn't pass the straight-face test to say pharmaceutical manufacturers are not emitting any of the compounds they're creating," said Kyla Bennett, who spent 10 years as an EPA enforcement officer before becoming an ecologist and environmental attorney.
Pilot studies in the U.S. and abroad are now confirming those doubts.
Last year, the AP reported that trace amounts of a wide range of pharmaceuticals — including antibiotics, anti-convulsants, mood stabilizers and sex hormones — have been found in American drinking water supplies. Including recent findings in Dallas, and Maryland's Prince George's and Montgomery counties, pharmaceuticals have been detected in the drinking water of at least 51 million Americans.
Most cities and water providers still do not test. Some scientists say that wherever researchers look, they will find pharma-tainted water.
-Jeremy Gantz
Huh,
I've been wondering why I cannot get enough water lately, but boy oh boy, I sure don't feel any pain and I don't think or worry as much.......
Meh. I'll keep drinking tap. The levels are too low to affect us, but the hormones could affect some of the fish.
Robster... How do you know what the levels even are if they don't test it?
Regardless of whether they have discovered a noticeable negative effect on human health, it is just wrong to dump your waste into rivers or lakes. These pharmaceutical companies make a shit load of profit off all of us. They should be able to afford the proper disposal system that would keep their pollution out of the water. I am sure the regulators are underfunded and are encouraged to look the other way for BIG PHARMA.
Much of the waste comes from the consumers of these drugs, even after ingested, by way of the toilet. It's not only from the pharm companies directly. Human beings are making a real mess.
they are our servants not our masters. they need to start asking and we need to start telling them to f'king ask. WTF?
Folks,
There is not pharmaceutical manufacturing operations in all of these places.
We are the source of this pollution. We take these drugs and some portion of the dose is not metabolised and is passed with urine and feces.
We have seen the enemy and it is us.
Pogo
We can thank Ronnie Raygun for this one. Jimmy Carter passed all those regulations to outlaw all the dumping of pollution into the waterways, and Ronnie gutted all the legislation. Your GOP at work again.
Most of the stuff in the environment is excreted unchanged in urine and feces of people taking the drugs. The sewage treatment plants do destroy the compounds and they wind up in drinking water. In addition there are problems with animals that are being treated with drugs, they produce waste that washes down stream from pastures and feed lots.
That's the truth
The future of pharmaceuticals is murder.
The levels of these drugs are far below what would have a biological effect. Imagine taking one of your daily pills and cutting off 1/1000th of it and swallowing it... do you think this would affect your body? It wouldn't.
This would be a good reason why everyone is messed up, only people who are really drugged up could believe in the Dem's or Repubs (=Kucinich and Paul aside) and only Messed up people could believe the 9/11 fairy Tale and the physics on how those steel buildings collapsed because of fire..LOL makes me laugh everytime.
Several points:
1) Yes, human sewage is the major source of the drugs and their metabolites, but manufacturing wastes could be a significant source of those and other compounds in our water supplies.
2) The low levels detected by testing of the water is NOT an accurate indication of biological impact, since organisms are well known to concentrate various contaminants from environmental exposure (anybody remember DDT?)
3) Drugs aren't the only problem. Ever wonder what happens to sucralose (which, by the way, is trichlorosucrose)? Well, most of it is.....you guessed it - excreted unchanged into waste water, where no one knows (or least is telling) what actually happens after that. Multiply this by many times over for other "harmless" substances found in our foods, drugs, and cosmetics, and you can see the magnitude of the REAL problem.
I think that there are two major sources: The first, correctly identified above, is our bodies. This could be the result of either poor drug design or over doses of medication by ignorant doctors or doctors in the Big Pham pocket. Ideally, medicine should not be wasted even through our effluent.
The second source I know to be true is garbage. I work in the waste management and recycling industry and see prescription bottles coming through our material recovery facility all the time. To properly depose of these things is an unbelievable hassle. In Minnesota, if it is narco, it requires special delivery by armed police officers to the nearest incineration sight regulated for handling meds. In our case this is 600 mi away in chicago. I doubt the cops even deal with it after we hand it over to them....
What is someone to do if he wants to dispose of outdated med. I had some and when I called the pharmacy was told there is no place to drop them off. Choice is to flush down toilet or put in trash which would wind up in a landfill - either way would eventually contaminate the water.
Harris, call your local municipal recycling/disposal center and ask if you can take the outdated meds to a hazardous waste drop-off site. If not, out them in a plastic bottle with a screw-on cap, close it tightly, and throw it away.
Thank goodness I drink well water.
These drugs and their residuals are already wrecking havoc on our ecology. This isn't a new matter, has been extensively reported upon and is obvious when you gaze upon our children (male and female) in grammar and Middle-school. I'm 58 years old, and yes, girls and boys in school did not look as they do today as they did i9n the 1950's. There is unequivocal evidence that pharmaceuticals in our water supply, plus all of the hormones being fed to chickens, beef, and other domesticated sources of food are directly affecting the consumers of those products.
This is an excerpt from an article that was authored on March 16, 2008. Unfortunately, the ramifications of pharmaceuticals in our water supply has been well-documented and the cost to wildlife and human beings has not yet been properly evaluated, but on the surface, it appears to be an ecological nightmare.
"Our Nation Is Depressed, Violence Is Rising And Now We May Have Some Answers!
Now, in a revelation that no one can predict what effects it will have on humans, we know that the water supply in the US and throughout the world has become contaminated by pharmaceutical by-products. What we eat and drink on a daily basis is proving to be harmful to fish and other creatures that inhabit our lakes and rivers - and if it is so concentrated that it’s causing deformities and other destabilizations of our ecology, what is the effect on human beings?
Prescription drugs found in drinking water across U.S.
(AP) — A vast array of pharmaceuticals — including antibiotics, anti-convulsants, mood stabilizers and sex hormones — have been found in the drinking water supplies of at least 41 million Americans, an Associated Press investigation shows.
Contamination is not confined to the United States. More than 100 different pharmaceuticals have been detected in lakes, rivers, reservoirs and streams throughout the world. Studies have detected pharmaceuticals in waters throughout Asia, Australia, Canada and Europe — even in Swiss lakes and the North Sea.
In the United States, the problem isn’t confined to surface waters. Pharmaceuticals also permeate aquifers deep underground, the source of 40 percent of the nation’s water supply. Federal scientists who drew water in 24 states from aquifers near contaminant sources such as landfills and animal feed lots found minuscule levels of hormones, antibiotics and other drugs.
Perhaps it’s because Americans have been taking drugs — and flushing them unmetabolized or unused — in growing amounts. Over the past five years, the number of U.S. drug prescriptions rose 12 percent to a record 3.7 billion, while nonprescription drug purchases held steady around 3.3 billion, according to IMS Health and The Nielsen Co. MUCH MORE http://justanothercoverup.com/?p=422 "
This contamination runs in our mountain streams, is in our aquifers, and affects approximately 58% of our population. Just because we drink well water, as I do, does not exempt us from an issue that has taken decades to manifest itself. The situation is to wide-spread and deeply seated in our water supply that I'm currently unaware of any solutions to what is obviously a long-term solution, if it is ever addressed with the importance it deserves.
William Cormier
The concentrations found in drinking water, consumed over a long period of time, and for some compounds, only a short period of time, are definitely a major health issue. One source not mentioned explicitely is out of date drugs that buyers throw down the toilet. This is particularly a problem with birth control pills, antibiotics, pain killers and antidepressants. For those here who do not comprehend or do not want to comprehend the scope of the problem perhaps a short course in biology or pharmacology would be apprpriate, assuming they are capable of learning.
It's like a free drug cocktail everytime you open the tap?
he'he, i on free barbituates an bennies (speed ball), mixed with lithium ,and
a few anti-psycotics, oxycodin, man i feel a rush just'thinking 'bout it?
thanks feds!
Big Pharma controls the regulators and politicians, big surprise. They've damaged a generation of kids with vaccines, with the help of the AAP, CDC and the FDA. Google Simpsonwood. What about the fluoride they're intentionally putting in the water? There was a study out of Harvard showing it causes bone cancer in growing boys (and that's the tip of the iceberg), but Colgate had that covered up since they fund the department chair. Time to wake up America.
When my father dies a few years ago from lung cancer -- he was poisoned by asbestos -- I was left with a huge amount of Oxycontin and other assorted drugs. I tried everything I could think of to get rid of the drugs (except selling them) but all anyone would tell me was to flush them down the toilet. I tried explaining that I did not want to add all this pharma to our environment but it seemed that only I was the only one that cared. I went through this with the hospice personnel (excellent people to whom we owe a great deal of thanks,) the NYC Dept. of Health, Coney Island hospital, the FDA, and other groups. Charities would not accept the drugs though they were in sealed containers packing their original shipping containers. We disparately need an entity that can we can give our pharma to for either reuse or environmentally sound recycling.
Robster, if it can affect the fish it will devastate our children.
Parapin anyone? Fresh from the tap!
Get back to watching American Idol CITIZEN, there is no need to worry about Millions of pounds of MEDICATION in your water.
Remember the Polar Bears Citizen, do not pay attention to REAL poisons that harm you daily.
Go back to sleep CITIZEN and drink the FLUORIDATED ZOLOFT water, it's good for you.
[...] Jeremy Gantz The Raw Story [...]
im more worried about poop getting in our drinking water, please, wash your hands before handling any food, and dont poop down our clean waters.
There are several pathways for these medical compounds:
1. The Manufacturers discharging unused products.
2. People and animals (livestock) passing these substances through their digestive systems, and..
3. Direct disposal of outdated or un-used medications and treatments directly from their toilets and sinks, right into our water supplies, where those HIGHER doses than the partially-metabolized concentrations, continue into our drinking water.
And people on wells CAN be impacted as these chemicals permeate groundwater formations, just as MTBE and other compounds have.
Biological studies of fish, amphibians and even HUMANS are showing increases in 'hermaphroditism" and mutation of males to female traits in succeeding generations.
Our wanton abuse of the environment is catching up. "Blinky" the fish of Simpsons notariety is becoming more a reality than imagined.
Well, Im saving up for my own atmospheric water generator that pulls the water straight from the air!
I drink plenty of water and culimately the exposure to all these chemicals cant be doing me any good.
I think the biggest source of water pollution is Industries. Who are releasing large amount of hazardous waste into our water resources. In order to do proper treatment of this waste water consultant like JNB must be contacted
[...] The Raw Story » Drugmakers, water pollution, and another ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ policy. Health, Political [...]
Future Provision of water is also depends on the safety of our water resources. Which are in danger due to pollution caused by industries and other sources. I think you should consider recycling of Industrial water. There many Industrial water treatment consultant including JNB who are providing great services.
Данной информации, не сомневаюсь, и так вполне достаточно, чтобы сделать вывод, как не надо делать.