Healthy and Green Living

As I promised, I’ve been reading up and asking around about the drugs in the water supply. Here’s what I’ve learned so far.

First: Here in the United States, we are fortunate to have an excellent water supply. For the most part, it is safe. Typhoid, cholera, and the like are not a problem. Whew, that’s a relief! Other, smaller, more subtle toxins, however, probably are a problem: arsenic, perchlorate, and phthalates, for example. But that’s an issue for another day.

Second: The amount of pharmaceuticals that researchers found is minuscule. This does not mean they are safe, just that the problem isn’t huge yet. One expert I spoke with assured me that the body breaks these things down with reasonable efficiency. Very small amounts shouldn’t have any serious effects, he said. He then pointed out that this efficiency varies from person to person. Some bodies do a better job than others. The ill, the old, the very young, and the very, very young (fetuses) are most at risk. Another expert pointed out (while again assuring me that the amounts were very tiny) that a combination of several drugs in any given tall, cool glass could enhance the problem. One thing all the experts agreed on when I asked if there are health risks at this low level of concentration: We don’t know.

Bottom line: As one expert succinctly said (after assuring me that the amounts were very tiny), “This isn’t good.” It is not a reason to panic; it is, however, a reason to be cautious. If you are pregnant, already ill, or have very young children, you might want to seek out a source of water that has been filtered using a process called “reverse osmosis” (a method that reportedly does a better job of reducing the amount of pharmaceuticals) or consider installing that type of filtration system in your home. The problem with this approach is that it puts uncontaminated water in reach only of those who can afford expensive filtration systems. Don’t switch to bottled water, though. Much of it is simply expensively packaged tap water. And the plastic bottles may well be more harmful to both you and the rest of the ecosystem than the low levels of drugs in your tap water.

Meanwhile, we should demand that something be done about the mess our environment is in. At this point, pharmaceuticals in the water are more a social and environmental issue than a health issue (our food supply is probably more harmful than our water supply at this point). Citizens—all citizens, rich and poor alike—of a modern, industrialized nation such as ours should expect safe drinking water. If the social contract doesn’t cover that much, we are in deep trouble. Now is the time to start agitating to get something done. Minuscule or not, we shouldn’t be taking other people’s drugs in every glass of water. We shouldn’t be exposing wildlife to our medicines, and we certainly shouldn’t be feeding them to our children.

Avery Hurt is a health and science journalist. Her work appears regularly in national publications such as: Better Homes and Gardens, Newsweek, and The New Physician. She is author of Bullet With Your Name On It: What You Will Probably Die From And What You Can Do About It (Clerisy Press, 2007) and Don’t Worry, I’m Not Contagious: Your Guide to Staying Healthy in an Infectious World, due out from Clerisy, fall 2008. She is at work on her third book, on alternative medicine.