41 million Americans get free prescription drugs delivered to their homes every day – in their tap water, according to a study conducted for the Associated Press. Water samples from fifty municipal systems were analyzed, and twenty-four were positive for traces of prescription and over-the-counter medications.
Concentrations of the pharmaceuticals are extremely weak, miniscule fractions of medical dosage, but the long-term effects on humans and wildlife concern scientists. The drugs enter the water supply as unmetabolized waste from humans, pets, and farm animals. Feed lots are especially rich sources of waste pharmaceuticals, especially hormones and antibiotics, as animals are dosed with drugs to promote rapid growth, not to treat illness.
Physicians and pharmacists have long told patients to dispose of outdated prescription drugs; these end up in wastewater and landfill. Conventional water treatment does not remove the drugs, but municipal water experts claim the substances are so diluted that water supplies are safe.
Sunday’s story by Jeff Donn, Martha Mendoza, and Justin Pritchard of AP’s National Investigative Team lists a few cities and some of the antibiotics, anticonvulsants, mood stabilizers and sex hormones found, and some possible implications for the environment and public health.
In the District of Columbia area, tests on water from the Washington Aqueduct revealed the anticonvulsant and mood-stabilizer carbamazepine (Tegretol), the human and veterinary antibiotic sulfamethoxazole (Gantanol), the animal antibiotic monensin (Rumensin), the disinfectant soap ingredient triclocarban, anti-inflammatories ibuprofen and naproxen, and caffeine. Carol D. Leonnig’s story in the Washington Post has reactions from local authorities.
This is not the first time scientists have described this phenomenon. Studies in 1999 and 2000 showed much the same results.
Pharmaceutical concentrations in the water supply may be minute, but these substances are designed to affect the human body, and traces that enter rivers, estuaries, bays, and lakes may become more concentrated in fish and seafood, working their way up the food chain to humans. There are also concerns that rivers and reservoirs may have become breeding grounds for antibiotic-resistant bacteria.
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March 12, 2008 at 5:53 pm
[...] recent Associated Press investigation that found prescription drugs in 41 municipal water systems is the latest in a series of such [...]