Pharmaceuticals in Metropolitan Drinking Supplies

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A recently unveiled investigation by the Associated Press is claiming that antibiotics, mood stabilizers and sex hormones were found in the tap water of 24 of the 62 US cities tested. For media analysts, this begs the question: how does one put lightly the fact that pharmaceuticals and hormones have been found in the drinking water of 41 million Americans? For the answer, let’s refer to one of the modern masters of corporate spin. I’ve chosen ABC News, rather arbitrarily. I could have just as easily picked CNN, CBS, MSNBC, the NYTimes, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, or Fox. It’s all the same… Though I don’t bother with Fox anymore… I like my disinfo a little more nuanced. Anyways, here is just the second page of the ABC News article entitled “Drugs in the Water: Reason to Worry?”

…The pharmaceutical industry points out the levels of drugs detected are minuscule. It says the amount of medication in the water supply is the equivalent of a single small pill in an Olympic-size swimming pool.

“No studies have demonstrated any effects on human health,” said Marjorie Powell, an attorney representing the pharmaceutical industry.

Let me stop you right there, ABC News, so that I can break this down. First of all, note the scientific irresponsibility behind the use of comparisons like “single small pill in an Olympic-size swimming pool.” We all know that approximately 1 million earth-sized planets would fit inside our sun. That’s a nice way to put the sun’s size in perspective, but you know what? The earth is still big! And even “trace amounts” of pharmaceuticals can have unpredictable cumulative effects, especially if they appear in various untested combinations with other drugs and hormones, and when they’re being ingested daily, throughout infancy and early childhood development. Not to mention the fact that these compounds and substances are going to combine in the body with still more “trace amounts” from other sources, such as the hormones in our milk and meat, and the unfortunate fact that we continue to fluoridate our water supply (which means adding trace amounts of Prozac to it is pretty much a non-issue — Prozac is just another fluorine compound).

And as for this lawyerly statement: “No studies have demonstrated any effects on human health.” Gee, could that be because no studies have been conducted? What’s the matter, Pharma, are you having trouble getting the grants for that study? Maybe running into some resistance from your shareholders?

No studies? Is that supposed to make us feel better? Even Aspartame was tested… I believe it killed all the monkeys, according to the study Searle submitted to the FDA… but at least they tested it!

Ok, back to the disinformation…

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said in a statement that it is concerned about “a growing number of pharmaceuticals in water.” Still, the EPA says water in the United States is some of the safest in the world.

This is a very carefully contrived statement. It is not necessarily false, but it is certainly misleading. It is true that America has been blessed with vast expanses of untouched natural beauty. Much of this has been destroyed, but as far as most countries are concerned, we’ve still got it pretty good. There is spring water and well water available in rural areas coast to coast that is still clean and drinkable. If you hold this water up to the global average, it does compare very favorably.

But what if you were to compare the water of our cities to the water available in the cities of other industrialized nations? Such a comparison would be far more relevant, as over 80% of the US population has been driven, like cattle, into the cities (according to the 2000 census, it’s probably more by now). This phenomenon is not isolated to the US, either. The U.N. estimated that 70 percent of the global population would be city dwellers by 2050. Now let’s turn back to the ABC article for a concept of how bad the water is in our cities (and this is with the spin)…

Have a glass of water in Philadelphia, for example, and you’re drinking tiny amounts of at least 56 pharmaceuticals or their byproducts.

Yowsers. And trust me -because I was born in Philly and lived there for years- most people in Philadelphia can’t afford Brita, much less bottled water. But as long as no studies were conducted… I’m sure they’ll all be fine. Let’s move on with the analysis…

There is some new advice to avoid exacerbating the problem. Instead of flushing unneeded medications down the toilet, the new recommendation is to discard drugs by diluting them with water or coffee grounds, putting them in a tight container and throwing them in the garbage.

Ok, time out, because now my mind hurts and I don’t know where to start with this one. ABC News has hit us with this stunning revelation that there are drugs in our water, and the solution they pose to us is for people to stop flushing them down the toilet? I don’t know how these drugs are getting in there, but I sincerely doubt that the root cause has anything to do with grandma getting rid of her extra meds. Who has extra pharmaceuticals to flush anyways? The only reason I know of to flush drugs is to hide them from the cops. So, ABC News, instead of focusing your attention on grandma, how about you demand some accountability from the Pharmaceutical industry? Why don’t you nail the FDA to the freaking wall like you should have done a hundred times already? Why don’t you point out the staggering population-wide increases in pharmacological use, particularly that of fluorine-based antidepressants? The number of fluoxetine prescriptions dispensed per year has increased from 2.47 million in 1988 to 33.32 million in 2002, according to a 2006 UCLA study.

According to the official story, the reason these meds are in the water in the first place is because they are excreted by the population into the waste-water, but not removed during water treatment. That basically means that we are medicating the ourselves so much that even people who aren’t prescribed are ingesting the drugs! And, for the record, I don’t believe that explanation for one second. I think it’s more than likely that at least a portion these pharma biproducts are a result of the manufacturing process, and another portion is probably put there deliberately. Either way, ABC News, you should be going after the corporations and the government agencies, not the consumers of your product (news?).

Let’s just finish this up. I can only take so much.

The best way to filter drugs out of tap water is called reverse osmosis, but it’s considered too expensive for treatment plants to implement without proof that the pharmaceuticals in the water are a real health threat.

Yep, that’s right news consumer. There’s nothing you can do. Don’t bother standing up to your corporate rulers. They will change nothing. Your government does not in any way represent or care about your interests. If you like, you can work overtime for your zaibatsu, and buy yourself a reverse osmosis filter.

Please note, reverse osmosis filtration does not remove sodium fluoride. If you have the means, you’d better just find a house in the country. Good luck finding work out there.

We are in topsy-turvy world, people. In much the same way as you are now guilty until proven innocent, the benefit of the doubt is now given to corporations and governments when it comes to issues of public health. They don’t have to prove that something is safe, they simply need to point to a lack of proof that it isn’t. Neither Pharma or the FDA makes any attempt to hide this state of affairs. It’s right there, in the mainstream press! And yet, somehow, even all of this is still not enough to make the average American stand up and say “hey, wait just one God-damn minute…”

And that, folks, is the greatest reason we have to end this tolerance for drugs in our drinking water.

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