Posted on 06/29/2008 6:32:12 PM PDT by Graybeard58
I flushed my pills down the toilet. The prescription had expired. I had a queasy impulse to jettison the medicine this way because of some vague understanding that expired medicine could be dangerous. It may, but not in the way I imagined.
Scientists are now finding a vast array of pharmaceuticals, from sex hormones, to anti-convulsants, to mood stabilizers, in the drinking water supplies of at least 41 million Americans, the Associated Press found recently.
The drugs get there via people like me, blithely tossing drugs into the water system — and through the natural metabolic practices of a country that takes 3.7 billion prescriptions and 3.3 billion over-the counter-drugs every year.
The fact that your drinking water contains a dash of Viagra and Lipitor does not necessarily mean that you'll develop a different set of sex organs — as some fish have. But a lot of people, like Dr. Marc Taylor, founder of the Pomperaug River Watershed Coalition, worry that absent a more aggressive approach to water management, a cool drink of water could be deleterious to your health.
The problem is that scientists — including those testing the Pomperaug River downstream from Heritage Village — don't know yet. The federal government doesn't require any testing and hasn't set safety limits for drugs in water. But scientists do know that strange deformities are showing up in fish and other animals that depend on this water. Certain fish, for instance, have developed severe reproductive problems. Female fish have developed male genital organs. The sperm and sperm counts of other fish, such as the endangered razorback sucker and male fathead minnow, have been damaged. Many scientists are blaming drugs in the water for these damages, and fear that as drug use increases among Americans, those problems will only exacerbate — and possibly jump to people.
"It's pretty clear that there are biological changes in the fish," Taylor told me. "What's less clear is: what is the connection to human health. Are the fish the canaries in the coal mine?"
Some scientists are beginning to think so.
"There ... is genuine concern that these compounds, in the small concentrations that they're at, could be causing
impacts to human health or to aquatic organisms," Mary Buzby, director of environmental technology for drug maker Merck & Co. Inc., told a conference last summer, AP reported.
"It's inescapable," Sudeep Chandra, an assistant professor at University of Nevada, Reno, told CNN. "There's enough global information now to confirm these contaminants are affecting organisms and wildlife."
With more of us getting older and living longer with chronic conditions, the number of drugs that go swirling down the drain is certain to increase. Prescription drug sales in the United States were $286.5 billion in 2007, 3.8 percent higher than the previous year, the AP reported. The number of prescriptions purchased grew 71 percent (2.1 billion to 3.6 billion) from 1994 to 2005, the Kaiser Family Foundation found.
"People think that if they take a medication, their body absorbs it and it disappears, but of course that's not the case," EPA scientist Christian Daughton, told the AP. One way or the other, it goes down the drain.
The Environmental Protection Agency's response is that that are no regulations for prescriptions in water because, as a spokesman told me, although the presence of drugs in the water is a "concern," "we don't believe that the levels of pharmaceuticals found in water pose a significant risk to human health." In other words, there are no regulations because scientists don't know whether this stuff is harmful yet. Moreover, figuring out which drugs in the broth of our drinking water might damage us is tricky — and expensive.
"The EPA has always been concerned with toxicity: In other words 'will it kill anybody?'" Taylor said. It has been less concerned with more subtle hormonal effects. The Pomperaug River Watershed Coalition has yet to complete its tests on whether the six to eight drugs the average Heritage Village resident takes daily is showing up downstream.
In the interim, the EPA has released guidelines (http://www.whitehousedrugpolicy.gov/drugfact/factsht/proper_disposal.html) for proper disposal of drugs. These include throwing the drugs in the trash with used coffee grounds or kitty litter, and putting them in impermeable containers, such as empty cans or sealable bags. Some communities have drug collection drives. Neither the Torrington Area Health District nor Chesprocott Health District have such programs. They should start.
Of course, if you had a devious turn of mind, you could simply pack up your prescription and send it back to the pharmaceutical company that made it.
After all, they're making enough money on these things, they should figure out what to do with them.
That is a good one. LOL
We definitely must cease giving (and taking) all drugs until the Human population has shrunk down to a sustainable level. When people are at about 2% of the current population, we can go back to being good vegan gathers (hunting is so cruel, don't you know.
I can think of no other solution. We must save the razorback sucker!!!!!!
Who flushes expired drugs into the toilet? Ever heard of “trash cans”? Oh ... wait a minute ... that might cause rats and seagulls to mutate into giant, hideous ...
What if I have a septic tank?
If it’s a pill that could be used later....i.e. PAIN pills...I don’t flush them ever.....the “expiry date” is a scam....the gov’t requires expire dates on EVERYTHING.....even on VINEGAR....sheesh. Besides, if they’ve “expired” they shouldn’t do any harm to the little fishies anyway....right?
I think I’m gonna flush some garlic,white wine,butter and parsley so the bastids are preped before i catch em!
What’s needed is to get rid of the idiotic laws prohibiting people from reselling or giving away prescription drugs they no longer need (along with the laws requiring prescriptions in the first place). It won’t help the stuff that survives being taken and is peed or pooped into the water supply, but it would sure take care of the problem of unused drugs being added to the problem, as well as helping a lot of people get drugs they couldn’t otherwise afford or just save money.
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