WP: Pharmaceuticals in Waterways Raise Concern:Effect on Wildlife, Humans

[DeepModem Mom]

Pharmaceuticals in Waterways Raise Concern
Effect on Wildlife, Humans Questioned

By Juliet Eilperin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, June 23, 2005; Page A03


Academics, state officials and environmental advocates are starting to question whether massive amounts of discarded pharmaceuticals, which are often flushed down the drain, pose a threat to the nation's aquatic life and possibly to people.

In waterways from the Potomac to the Brazos River in Texas, researchers have found fish laden with estrogen and antidepressants, and many show evidence of major neurological or physiological changes.

No one has seen evidence of effects on human health, but a number are asking publicly why the federal government is not taking a more aggressive approach to what they see as a looming problem....

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Senate Minority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.), who has secured $2.5 million over the past decade to fund the Geological Survey's water quality studies in the Las Vegas Valley, said the government needs "to do a comprehensive national study to determine how these contaminants might affect our health, our water supplies and our environment. I think it would be irresponsible not to provide funding on this issue. It is a wise, and necessary, investment in our future."

But several rank-and-file EPA employees said senior agency officials have expressed little interest in the subject. Hilary Snook, an EPA research scientist who has been analyzing pharmaceutical levels in about 45 water samples from Maine, Connecticut, New Hampshire and Vermont, said he has yet to receive funding from headquarters for the project. As a result, he said, his office lacks the money to complete the study quickly....


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/22/AR2005062201988.html

[truthisfreedom]

1. wait a minute... we can't possibly be flushing leftover pills down the

drain at a rate high enough to do this. this must be from high levels of pharm chemicals in urine! that's the only real explanation.

[DeepModem Mom]

3. You could be right, truth. nt

[corbett]

7. High Levels In All Human Excrement

It's been a dirty little secret of the pharmaceutical industry for years that pills which are produced through heating are digested at a much lower rate than capsules and pills produced without heat.

The presence of all of these drugs in water led me to install a reverse osmosis filter on my kitchen sink so that I can drink water which is hospital grade. Sadly, wildlife don't have that option.

[rodeodance]

2. of course the US has no $ for important health issues such as this.

[MountainLaurel]

4. Remember the menstruating boy story

From last week -- I wonder if there's a connection.

[DeepModem Mom]

5. Sounds like a possibility, ML. When will press and public wake up...

to the critical importance of environmental issues, and the failure of the Bush administration to address them?

[MountainLaurel]

6. Who knows?

My first thought when I saw that story was recalling several articles in the WashPost recently about fish in various places along the Potomac where males were found to also have the internal reproductive organs of female fish. The presumed cause is agricultural runoff, but it's unlikely we'll see any uproar soon.

Unfortunately, it's not just the Bush junta we have to worry about. There's a long history in this country of the government's refusal to examine environmental hazards caused by industry, no doubt because the feds are afraid of what they'll find: abnormal rates of breast cancer in certain neighborhoods, rare cancers affecting people exposed to fertilizers and pesticides, frogs with an extra leg or two.

[earthboundmisfit]

8. Energy will always be a concern, but safe water will always be a NECESSITY

I know energy for our various needs is at the front of our collective mind, but we damn sure better be focusing more on clean, safe water, also - and SOON.

[Al-CIAda]

9. hidden mass medication of the unsuspecting public -

Anti-Depressant 'Found in Drinking Water'
Sun 8 Aug 2004
By Jennifer Sym, PA News
Britons could unwittingly be swallowing traces of anti-depressant Prozac and other drugs in drinking water, according to a report released today.
Environmentalists have labelled the situation “hidden mass medication of the unsuspecting public” after the study states pharmaceutical residues can travel through the sewage system and end up in the “aquatic environment”.
The levels of any such residue is unknown, and the Environment Agency has called on the drugs industry to prove its products are unlikely to cause significant harm to the environment.
According to the study by Norman Baker MP, Liberal Democrat shadow environment secretary, Prozac has been found by the EA to be “both toxic and persistent” and “a substance that could be of potential concern”.
There has been a 166% increase in prescriptions for anti-depressants in England since 1991 – up to 24 million a year.
Mr Baker said: “This looks like a case of hidden mass medication of the unsuspecting public and is potentially a very worrying health issue.
“The Government is quite simply not taking its responsibility to public health seriously.
“It is alarming that there is no monitoring of levels of Prozac and other pharmacy residues in our drinking water.
“There is also no evidence that filtration eliminates these contaminants from water and Ministers don’t even know which water works are fitted with which filtering devices anyway.
--
In its study, the Agency reviewed 500 of the most commonly used pharmaceuticals in England and Wales and monitored 12 thought to pose the greatest potential environmental threat, including painkillers, antibiotics, anti-cancer drugs and anti depressants.
Of these, 10 were found in sewage treatment work effluents and eight were detected in the rivers receiving these effluents.
The LibDem report says the Drinking Water Inspectorate Regulations do not specify limits for pharmaceutical residues in drinking water and these are not tested for during water quality assessments.

Full-
http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=3310754

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BBC Article-Prozac 'found in drinking water'
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/3545684.stm

[DeepModem Mom]

10. Wow! Thanks for adding this link, Al. nt

[Al-CIAda]

11. But wait, there's more...

Chief Inmate declares nation an asylum Prozac-popping prez recommends mandated mental health screening for all Americans
http://proliberty.com/observer/20040806.htm

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The Psycho State
by Rep. Ron Paul, MD (R, Texas)

 A presidential initiative called The “New Freedom Commission on Mental Health” has issued a report recommending forced mental health screening for every child in America, including preschool children. The goal is to promote the patently false idea that we have a nation of children with undiagnosed mental disorders crying out for treatment.

One obvious beneficiary of the proposal is the pharmaceutical industry, which is eager to sell the psychotropic drugs that undoubtedly will be prescribed to millions of American schoolchildren under the new screening program. Of course a tiny minority of children suffer from legitimate mental illnesses, but the widespread use of Ritalin and other drugs on youngsters who simply exhibit typical rambunctious, fidgety, and impatient behavior is nothing short of criminal. It may be easier to teach and parent drugged kids, but convenience is no justification for endangering them. Children’s brains are still developing, and the truth is we have no idea what the long-term side effects of psychiatric drugs may be. Medical science has not even exhaustively identified every possible brain chemical, even as we alter those chemicals with drugs.

Dr. Karen Effrem, a physician who strongly opposes mandatory mental health screening, warns us that “America’s children should not be medicated by expensive, ineffective, and dangerous medications based on vague and dubious diagnoses.” She points out that psychiatric diagnoses are inherently subjective, as authors of the diagnostic manuals admit. She also is concerned that mental health screening could be used to label children whose attitudes, religious beliefs, and political views conflict with the secular orthodoxy that dominates our schools.

Full-
September 14, 2004
Dr. Ron Paul is a Republican member of Congress from Texas.
http://www.lewrockwell.com/paul/paul203.html

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11. Freedom Commission Roadmap Awaited
The release of the first iteration of the roadmap to operationalize the findings of the President’s New Freedom Commission on Mental Health is imminent. We will disseminate the document when it is unveiled. On a related note, the British Medical Journal, in anticipation of the roll-out, alleged in a disjointed story that the Bush administration will announce a plan to screen all Americans for mental disorders and promote antidepressant and antipsychotic drug use – allegations which we are told are well beyond the scope of anything the administration has planned and which seem to stem from a psychiatric survivors group. The BMJ story has gained some traction in derivative reports on the Internet, though mainstream media have not touched the story, in part thanks to APA’s work, for which the administration is appreciative.

http://www.psych.org/join_apa/mb/newsletters/advocacy/AdvNewsJuly2004.htm#21

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LLINOIS launches compulsory mental health screening -WHY YOU NEED TO BE CONCERNED
Commentary by Laura Dawn Lewis

If you haven't noticed yet, the majority of new laws and policies being implemented are sold on fear through the necessity of good intentions and as a way to protect you by allowing your government to take care of you, as if the government is a better steward of your body, soul and mind. Each is euphemized to seem harmless and necessary.  Every time a law is passed, you give up a portion of your freedom.  This is a fact.  Some laws are necessary to allow society to function toward a common good.  Laws like murder is bad.  Stealing is unjust and beating a child unacceptable.  These create the commonalities that define civilization. 
Since September 11th, 2001 our governments, state, local and federal continue to push through resolutions, legislation and ideas directly in contradiction to the rules we've already established for America, set forth in our Constitution.  In effect, each of these chips at our civil liberties, forcing us further away from our values and principles.  This law in Illinois represents one such example.  Without a doubt the women pushing it through created it with the best of intentions; yet anytime something becomes mandatory, intentions become abuses.  The following are the key reasons I believe the citizens of Illinois and the rest of us in the United States must object to this legislation.  If we allow it to pass in one state without confronting it, others will follow.

Full-
http://www.couplescompany.com/Features/Politics/2004/BigBrotherPregnancy.htm