...Prozac in the water supply...
Crossposted from ProMED
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PHARMACEUTICALS CONTAMINATING DRINKING WATER (02)
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A ProMED-mail post
[see also:
Pharmaceuticals contaminating drinking water: Corr... 980409213226
Pharmaceuticals contaminating drinking water supplies 980405151744]
Author: Joel Lusk at 2AL-ABQES Date: 3/26/98 8:50 AM
PHARMACEUTICALS CREATE DRINKING WATER HEADACHE
Pharmaceuticals of all kinds are turning up in European water supplies,
according to an article published in the March 21 issue of *Science News.*
Cholesterol-lowering drugs, antibiotics, analgesics, antiseptics, and
beta-blocker heart drugs, are
just a few of the drugs in the drinking water, lakes, rivers, and streams
of Europe.
There are practically no data for gauging the potential toxicity of these
pharmaceuticals to humans, wildlife or aquatic ecosystems, scientists say.
New studies show the drugs are coming from human wastes. Half of a
prescribed pharmaceutical may be excreted from the patient's body in its
original form, or in another biologically active form. In some cases up to
90 percent of the drugs originally ingested find their way into water
supplies.
Scientists say that partially degraded drugs may be converted back into
their active form through chemical reactions that occur in the environment.
This year, the Swiss Federal Research Station documented the presence of
clofibric acid, a widely-used cholesterol-lowering drug, throughout
Switzerland's waters - from rural mountain lakes to rivers flowing through
densely populated areas. The wide-spread presence of clofibric acid, which
is not even manufactured in Switzerland, is evidence that it did not come
from some industrial accident or spill, but from human wastes, says Swiss
scientist Hans-Rudolf Buser.
Scientists with the Technical University of Berlin have conducted research
showing high levels of clofibric acid (4 parts per billion [ppb]) in Berlin
groundwater and at levels of up to 0.2 ppb in all tap water sampled in the
study. A Berlin team of scientists has also found in Berlin's drinking
water additional drugs that regulate blood-lipid levels (such as phenazone
and fenofibrate) and analgesics (including ibuprofen and diclofenac).
In other research in Germany, chemist Thomas Ternes, with the municipal
water research laboratory in Wiesbaden, Germany, launched a water
monitoring project and detected 30 of 60 common pharmaceuticals in sewage,
treated water, and in nearly all streams and rivers in Germany.
These include: lipid-lowering drugs, antibiotics, analgesics, antiseptics,
beta-blocker heart drugs, and drugs to control epilepsy.
The concentrations of antibiotics being found in German wastewater suggest
that, "these antibiotics may be present at levels of consequence to
bacteria - levels that could not only alter the ecology of the environment
but also give rise to antibiotic resistance," says Stuart Levy, who directs
the Center for Adaptation Genetics and Drug Resistance at Tufts University
in Boston.
The same drugs could be found in U.S. waters if they were monitored for
pharmaceuticals, the article suggests. Responsibility for directly
monitoring U.S. waters for drugs falls neither under the jurisdiction of
the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) nor under the U.S. Food and
Drug Administration (FDA).
"The issue of drugs in water is certainly an area where we could use a lot
more science," says James Pendergast, acting director of the EPA division
that regulates what comes out of sewage-treatment plants. "To date,
information on hazards (to wildlife or to people) at the nanogram level
just hasn't been developed."
Pendergast says water-quality engineers recognize that one of the
highest-volume contaminants emerging in sewage-plant effluent, especially
early in the morning, is caffeine, a substance excreted by all those people
who regularly rely on their morning coffee to jump-start the day.
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ProMED-mail
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[Although this is an infectious disease list, we also monitor
antibiotic resistance, and we suppose that apart from the threat to
the biosphere, the presence of antibiotics in the water supply may
contribute to that problem also - Mod.JW]
...........................................jw/es
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