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Pharmaceutical-Flavored Water?
Our water supply has a drug problem.Will your next refreshing glass of water actually be a drug cocktail? A just-released 5-month AP investigation indicates this is more than likely. Albeit in miniscule amounts, drugs-- including antibiotics, anticonvulsants, mood stabilizers and sex hormones--were present in the drinking water supplies of 24 metropolitan areas, including southern California, northern New Jersey, Detroit, Washington D.C., Philadelphia, PA, and Louisville, KY.
Although you're unlikely to notice any immediate effects (to reach a therapeutic dose of any of the drugs detected, you'd need to swallow 120 Olympic size pools of water), long term chronic exposure to this pharmaceutical cocktail may not be safe.
"These are chemicals that are designed to have very specific effects at very low concentrations. That's what pharmaceuticals do," notes John Sumpter, Distinguished Professor of Ecotoxicology at Brunel University, London.
Sumpter, who pioneered the field now known as endocrine disruption, was one of the first to show that effluents from sewage treatment contain estrogenic hormones, including estradiol, the main component of the contraceptive pill. His work lead to the surprising (at the time) conclusion that human drugs were getting into rivers and causing intersexuality in fish.
Fish may be more sensitive than humans (after all they breathe water), but do we want to just wait to see if humans are affected?
"We know we are being exposed to other people's drugs through our drinking water, and that can't be good," says Dr. David Carpenter, a professor at the Environmental Health and Toxicology Division, School of Public Health at the University of Albany in New York.
And while prescription drugs are subjected to clinical trials to evaluate their safety in humans, it behooves us to realize that even those that are passed with a supposedly clean bill of health cheat, in real life terms, to get it.
Drugs are evaluated as single agents, typically over a period of months. In real life-and now in our water supply-drugs are not artificially constrained to one at a time, and the exposure is often not for a few months. In the case of our water, it's for a lifetime.
Pharmaceuticals not only frequently produce significant undesirable side effects when given one at a time-properly prescribed and administered drugs are the 4th leading cause of death in the U.S.-they also interact with other drugs, and the results of these interactions have not been evaluated.
How do the drugs get in our water?
The drugs we take are not completely metabolized into harmless compounds, but pass out of our bodies in urine and feces. And even the drugs we don't take end up in the water supply: more than half of us flush unused and expired meds down the toilet.
Plus, we're not the only ones using drugs. Cattle are given steroids to bulk up, and pets are being medicated for everything from arthritis, cancer, and heart disease to diabetes, allergies, dementia and that Western lifestyle affliction, obesity, to the tune of $5.2 billion over the past five years. The most recent data shows Americans increased their spending on animal meds nearly 10% in 2006. (Animal Health Institute: http://www.ahi.org/index.asp)
What's a consumer to do?
Lessen the load on the ecosystem:
- Dispose of unused or unwanted medications at take-back sites or ask your doctor, nearby hospital or pharmacist to take back unused and expired drugs. Do NOT flush unused meds down the toilet or toss them in the trash. Check the www.earth911.org database or contact your local household and hazardous waste office to find out a drug-take-back program nearby.
- Purchase drugs in small amounts; they'll cost you less and you won't end up with leftovers.
- Work with a health care provider to develop health and wellness strategies you can commit to; you'll feel better, enjoy life more, and reduce your need for medications.
- When medication is necessary, ask your doctor or pharmacist for one with the least environmental impact.
Lessen the load on your body:
In addition to lessening your need for drugs by taking steps to become healthier, you can improve the quality of the water you drink by:
- Filtering your water. For information on the various types of filters, check the National Resources Defense Council website: (http://www.nrdc.org/water/drinking/gfilters.asp)
- Putting your filtered water in a reusable glass or stainless steel pitcher or bottle. Plastic bottles contain compounds, such as bisphenol A (BPA) and polyethylene terephthalate (PET), that have been shown to migrate into the beverages they contain. BPA A has been shown to be both estrogenic and neurotoxic. PET plastics used for water bottles leach antimony, a regulated contaminant with both acute and chronic health dangers. ( Le HH, Carlson EM, Chua JP, Belcher SM. Bisphenol A is released from polycarbonate drinking bottles and mimics the neurotoxic actions of estrogen in developing cerebellar neurons. Toxicol Lett. 2008 Jan 30;176(2):149-56. Westerhoff P, Prapaipong P, Shock E, Hillaireau A. Antimony leaching from polyethylene terephthalate (PET) plastic used for bottled drinking water.
Water Res. 2008 Feb;42(3):551-6. Shotyk W, Krachler M.
Contamination of bottled waters with antimony leaching from polyethylene terephthalate (PET) increases upon storage. Environ Sci Technol. 2007 Mar 1;41(5):1560-3. PMID: 17396641.
TYPES OF FILTERS
Carbon filters remove many organic chemicals and chlorine and radon. Carbon filters should be of good quality and maintained properly. Because bacteria can grow on some filters, it is imperative that carbon filters be changed frequently.
Reverse osmosis units remove most toxic minerals and organic chemicals but generally do not remove radon or chlorine. They should be used with carbon filters. Reverse osmosis units are slow and should only be used for drinking water at a spigot. The purified water becomes aggressive and can corrode the pipes of the delivery system. These pipes and faucets should not be made of lead or lead components.
Distillation removes pollutants by boiling water and cooling the steam so it condenses back into water. Distillation is slow and expensive and distilled water is poorly buffered. Therefore, distilled water can be highly aggressive and should be stored in glass or other inert containers.
Water softeners remove calcium and magnesium from “hard” water and make it clean better. However, calcium and magnesium are considered human nutrients.
The healthiest water is free of pollutants but contains beneficial minerals like calcium and magnesium.
by Lara Pizzorno
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Technorati Tags: drugs, drinking water, contaminants, contamination, water
9 Comments:
Why don't we collect water the old fashioned way-in a water barrel, filter it and then boil it?
Dear Ruby My mother collected water the old fashion way and said, I don't think so, it hard work for a family living in NM. She left us on 1-11-08 at the age of 79 years old. Cancer took her in one month. We need water to live or we will die. The water I use is delivery, the reason a friend has cancer and the only water she can drink is delivery, per her MD. Something is wrong with our water. Cancer kills
If you want to completely remove these new emerging contaminants and any others from your water, a combined system approach like the one used by Pure Water Systems, Inc. (http://www.purewatersystems.com) will give you piece of mind knowing that whatever shows up in your water, it will have been removed by your water purifier. I recommend you check out their products, by far the most thorough design I have seen.
Also, in response to the idea that you can have purified water that still has "beneficial" minerals lets consider that statement... this is the kind of non-scientific statement that has no genuine support by the scientific community. First, what would be considered the "beneficial" minerals, at what concentrations are they beneficial, and at what concentration are they harmful? (Flouride, while controversial, would be considered by many as beneficial, but over 4 parts per million is condsidered dangerous -- how would anyone build a water filter capable of determining, then limiting, which contaminants are filtered. The only reasonable solution is to remove ALL the contaminants, including mineral salts, metals, pharmaceuticals, herbicides, pesticides, solvents, radioactivity, etc. Then take a vitimin or mineral suppliment if you choose, or EAT FOOD. Considering water to be a source for minerals in the diet makes as much sense as sucking on stones.
help me please because i can not sleep at night
Geez...this is scary stuff. I like to buy Fiji Water to drink, but it's pretty expensive. This is excellent information, even though it's painful to read.
Excellent article. Nice summary of the problem and solutions. Much appreciated
Much appreciate the good info.
Today, my 8 year old son chose not to get a drink from the school water fountain and when the teacher asked why, he said that his mother didn't like him to drink from water fountains. She followed up by rolling her eyes at him.
We have an older son who has Spina Bifida, has a trach and on a vent at night. He has been hospitalized a few times for pneumonia, mrsa and needing surgeries such as chest tubes etc. Therefore, our family is very germ conscious.
My questions is, are we just being paranoid?
I recently heard that "de-mineralized" water is toxic to humans because it is chemically active and pulls needed substances from our bodies. I keep some DISTILLED water for emergencies as I assume that it is sterile & can be stored for long periods; because it is condensed from steam, is it also de-mineralized? What is the best water to keep for emergencies?
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