Pharmaceutical Drugs, Hormones, and Chemicals in the Water
We read more and more all the time about more and more pharmaceutical drugs, hormones, perchlorate, mtbe and other chemicals in the water, and more and more people are getting really concerned. We won't spend a lot of time here talking about the risks. You are probably reading this because you already are concerned about the risks of drugs in the water - and you want to know what you can do about it.
One illustration of how much pharmaceuticals have infiltrated our water supplies, however, came from testing of fish caught in water downstream from sewage plants in five U.S. cities. They all contain traces of many pharmaceuticals. In the fish from one location, Chicago's North Shore Channel, the breakdown showed:
Dilitiazem, an antihypertensive - 0.13 nanograms per gram of fish
Diphenhydramine, antihistamine - 1.4 nanograms per gram
Carbamazepine, antiseizure - 2.3 nanograms per gram
Norfluoxetine, an antidepressant by-product - 3.2 nanograms per gram of fish
Now a nanogram is a very tiny amount, and it is reported that you'd have to eat tons of such fish for such small concentrations to effect human health. But what about if you drink the water with all these drugs in it?
We all love those charts that has a long list of all the contaminants that a given filter will remove and that show the exact percentage that each metal, chemical, etc. is removed. Such test results can serve some purpose and provide an indicator about the effectiveness of a particular filter. You will find some test results like that on this site. However, there are some things that really limit their usefulness. One is that testing a filter at one stage - likely when it is new or almost new - doesn't really tell you how well it will work after three, six or twelve months of usage. It's pretty easy to set up a test to show a large percentage of contaminants filtered out by a newer filter, but have its performance tail off dramatically because there isn't enough filtration material for it to continue at that level for long. Another particularly relevant issue as regards the every-growing stew of small amounts of chemicals and pharmaceuticals and illegal drugs in the water is that it is hard to do a realistic test.
What is in your water supply one day could vary a lot from what is there a month later. How the chemicals and drugs in your water supply combine is simply unknown. How can it be known exactly what a filter will remove when you don't know what is in the water to begin with - and when it varies by variety and time and place and amount?
Should We Be Concerned About Drugs in the Water Supply?
We think so, yes.
On the topic of drugs in the water, an AP study has reported that 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.
It appears that the 41 million number is a result of the partial survey they did. Many areas were not tested. So we can be sure that there are drugs in the water in many other ares too. There are also small amounts of over-the-counter medicines including acetaminophen and ibuprofen Some wonder how concerned we should be.
Friendsofwater.com hears from many customers who are quite concerned. We share that view.
In the United States, the problem isn't confined to surface waters. Drugs also permeate deep underground aquifers which provide 40 percent of the country's water supply. Human drugs are the not the only source, they also come from cattle and pet drugs.
At this point science tells us that we don't yet know the impact of ingestion of low levels of drugs. And the concentrations are tiny (at least so far). One concern is that the AP study has shown that water providers rarely disclose results of pharmaceutical screenings. Of those areas tested, fewer than half of the large metropolitan, and almost no smaller providers, even test the water for drugs. A California provider suggested that the impacts aren't known yet, and the information might unduly ause alarm. Well, we think it might just cause appropriate alarm! The view that Americans can't handle information is offensive, and we've heard it too many times before. (Thanks to AP for doing this study.)
HOW MUCH RISK IS THERE?
The EPA has said they "recognize it is a growing concern [about drugs in the water] and we're taking it very seriously." Reecent studies which have found alarming effects on human cells and wildlife.
Drugs in water ways are damaging wildlife across the nation and around the globe, research shows. Notably, male fish are being feminized, creating egg yolk proteins, a process usually restricted to females. Pharmaceuticals also are affecting what are called sentinel species at the foundation of the pyramid of life - such as earth worms in the wild and zooplankton in the laboratory, studies show.
Some scientists stress that the research is extremely limited, and there are too many unknowns. They also express however, that the documented health problems in wildlife are disconcerting.
Recent laboratory research has found that small amounts of medication have affected human embryonic kidney cells, human blood cells and human breast cancer cells. The cancer cells proliferated too quickly; the kidney cells grew too slowly; and the blood cells showed biological activity associated with inflammation.
There's growing concern in the scientific community, meanwhile, that certain drugs - or combinations of drugs - may harm humans over decades because water, unlike most specific foods, is consumed in sizable amounts every day. And, unlike many other contaminants found in water, drugs are designed to have an impact on biological functions!
Our bodies may shrug off a relatively big one-time dose, yet suffer from a smaller amount taken in continuously over a many years. Impacts might stimulate allergies or cause nerve damage. Pregnant women, the elderly and the very ill might be more at risk than most (as usual).
"These are chemicals that are designed to have very specific effects at very low concentrations. That's what pharmaceuticals do. So when they get out to the environment, it should not be a shock to people that they have effects," says zoologist John Sumpter at Brunel University in London, who has studied trace hormones, heart medicine and other drugs.
While drugs are tested to be safe for humans, the timeframe is usually over a matter of months, not a lifetime. Drugs also can produce side effects and interact with other drugs at normal medical doses. There are no controls over which drugs are taken in this way, so negative interactions are certainly possible. That's why, except for fluoride, pharmaceuticals are prescribed to people who need them, not delivered to everyone in their drinking water.
WAITING FOR SCIENCE TO DECIDE?
We like to use the information available to us and reach our own conclusions. We remember that the medical industry in not-so-distant decades told us that tobacco was good for us, that lead and asbestos were not dangerous, and that human activity was not impacting the climate. Many still argue that fluoride has no risk in our water supply, despite that fact that we now intake fluoride at 4 times the level we did when they started adding fluoride to the water supply. We now ingest it from other sources too, including our food and drinks. We are baffled as to why so many put common sense behind what science has proven. We're not anti-science, we love it. But it shouldn't replace our ability to think for ourselves.
Our preference is not to wait for science to declare when something is dangerous, but to use our own common sense. This leads us to the following conclusion:
Taking drugs intended for others is a bad idea!
Don't let your body be an unintended science experiment.
WILL FILTERS REMOVE PHARMACEUTICALS?
Most filters have not yet been tested to determine if and to what extent drugs will be removed. We also know that people don't like to hear it, but test results can be misleading. Tests are naturally enough done with new filters. The tests normally often don't indicate how long that level of filtration will last when the filters are put to work.
The filters sold by friendsofwater.com are designed to remove contaminants, and do so very effectively. This includes not only those contaminants that were identified at some past time, but the new ones showing up in our water. In our standard single-canister kitchen filter, whether countertop or undercounter, there is kdf which removes chemical contaminants, and granulated carbon which removes organic contaminants. The drugs found in our water are either one or the other. Some specific additives to the water require additional filtering; that's why we add an extra canister for fluoride or for chloramines or nitrates.
