No one in the Philadelphia area would be fazed. (I guess I'm a converted Philadelphian now.) The local river out here, the Schuylkill, has had a problem with so many contaminants that psych meds are the least of anyone's worries.

P.S. Wyeth's offices are about 20 minutes away from me and AstraZeneca has a huge corporate center right across the border in Delaware. Not that it matters, but...

While this is an interesting indicator of the extent to which modern society relies on psychiatric medicine, I think it's important to put the health consequences of these findings in perspective. Let's take a random lake near Washington, Angle Lake. Its volume is about3.2 billion L, so it weighs about 3.2 trillion grams. Toss 7 extra-strength Tylenols in there, and you have contaminated it at more than one part per trillion. Even at one part per billion, you'd need to drink 200,000 liters of water to get your 200 mg daily dose of Lamictal. (All of this is assumng I haven't screwed up the math, which is possible.) While it would certainly be desirable to get these things out of the water supply, it's difficult to believe the doses here are actually going to mess with anyone's head.

I would expect psych meds to be disproportionately flushed rather than thrown into the trash, because of the control family members may want to exert on patient's "compliance" with a given drug regimen.

The point is that it stands to reason that the very biggest pharma loser drugs are going to be the ones that wind up in the water supply.

Is it possible this environmental impact will be used as an excuse to administer drugs in a more "direct-to-consumer" manner (ie by injectable or other longterm/involuntary route)?

RE:simon "mess with anyone's head"
You apparently know little of chemistry, alligators were a Canaries in the Coal Mine mine to show people environmental contaminants messed with the alligator biology. "17 beta-Estradiol and tamoxifen caused sex reversal from male to female"
Pesticide exposure: female reproductive system
In particular, chemicals mimicking endogenous estrogen via estrogen receptor (ER) have been the focus of research for the last 20 years.

Simon, University of Georgia researchers have found that fluoxetine (Prozac) in our water system, while not acutely toxic, delays development in fish and delays metamorphosis in frogs.

http://georgiafaces.caes.uga.edu/storypage.cfm?storyid=2023

Also, the amounts of these drugs taken to cause such a finding is shocking.

I wonder if it would be possible to put Zyprexa into Eli Lilly's corporate water fountains. Especially since they say it is so benign.

There are no long term studies for the trace amount of psychiatric medication level safety in water, to possibility downplay this story.

Each person is different, and this should cause just as much alarm as the hormones found in beef and milk; or lead in school water supplies.

Girls over the years have started menstruating at earlier ages for example, by age 9-10 rather than a typical age of 12-14 , just a few decades ago and this has long been discussed in theory due to the hormones that were being found in the beef and milk.

The findings of all of these medications is a health alert and as far as I am concerned a reason to have home tap water tested.

I find it interesting that trace amounts can be shoved off in thought as to not being enough to harm or create issue with a persons body or mind in some ppl's thinking process.

We will never know real outcomes of who has been affected by this, because there still are no long term studies decent enough for people who DO take the drugs and the safety of them.

Water goes into the ponds as run off from our yards, it waters vegetables, fruit, this affects the entire eco-system, in very broad ways, and once this happens, it's no different that mercury found in fish in lakes.

I feel this is an alarming piece of news that should not be taken lightly, because it is not just medication ppl digest and excrete; but also medication thrown into landfills, or flushed whole down toilets,or down sink drains.

The higher the stats are of Americans taking these medications the higher the % goes up and will go up regarding contamination of more than water. Life cycles of plants and animals are connected to human existence, and it's all threatened.

Martha,

Maybe they already are putting zyprexa in the water fountains at Eli Lilly. That could explain why so many employees are complicit in EL's reprehensible actions - just kidding, still I'm wondering how much of something how many people have to take to make traces of it show up in treated water and what else might be in the water, Caffeine, glucose, who knows...unless it turns out this study was funded by the Federation of Bottled Water Sellers;o.

You know people really need to stop being TOLD that the proper way to dispose of thier unused medications is to flush them. I've had a few doctors over the years tell me to do that. STUPIDTY at it's best. And really, flushing pills doesn't always work, sometimes they just wont flush at all.

Now I don't believe in wasting medications and since most of these meds have quite a few years of time until they'll expire I *usually* find someone within those # of years, who has an rx to the same medication that I have a bottle of and I'll give it to them.
Yeah it's illegal but you know what? I don't care. It's not like I am handing out narcotics as all the meds I end up not being able to take after the intitial trial are generaly psych meds used for Bipolar Disorder and Psychotic sort of stuff.
And I would NEVER give a medication to a person who doesn't have a precription for that medication anyways. I don't try to play doctor. But if I know someone who can't afford the hundreds of dollars a month and is at risk for having to quit thier med cold turkey cause of expense and I have a bottle of that medication, I'll give it to them. Usually it has turned out for the best that way and I have allowed a few people the "time" because of those extra meds, to find a way to pay for thier rx's in the future... like a patient assistance program (PAP) of some sort or a free community mental health services clinic. I find that to be a MUCH better way to "dispose" of my medications than flushing them or throwing them away.

And when a med has reached it's expiration date I will THROW IT IN THE GARBAGE.

At least at landfills there are great measures taken to keep the many many toxic substances that go into them from reaching the water supply. And so what if some bum finds them in the dumpster befor they reach the landfill? If they feel like trying out Abilify or Lamictal etc, to see if it gives them a buzz I'm not gonna feel bad about it... though thinking about that possibility (there are homeless in my area that *might* go thru our dumpster) maybe I should be more responsible and put a note in the bottle with the meds that says a little bit about what is safe and not safe about that medication and what it is used for, that it's reached it's expiration date etc. (because I tear off the part of the label that has MY info on it befor I throw the bottles out and sometimes that area of the label also has the drug name etc on it) That way if anyone does find it I at least know they know what medication they have in thier hands and if it's something like lamictal they know it wont get them high and if they do attempt to take it and take more than 50mg they are risking getting a very bad medical reaction (the stevens johnsons rash) etc etc.
or I guess the pharmacy would take it back and dispose of it themselves, though I don't know if they end up putting the stuff down the drain or what.... do they have LOCKING dumpsters to throw away meds, or keep them inside and have a special hazardous waster service that disposes of the stuff? I'll have to go ask them how they handle this stuff. But what worries me is I have had one pharmacist tell me to just flush the meds when I asked if I should bring them to the pharmacy to be disposed of... so it makes me wonder how responsible they are and if there are any "industry standards" when it comes to the disposal of unused medications.

Well anyways, long post short: I think people should put thier unused med in the TRASH instead of flushing them because at least when they go to a landfill they are going to a place that 1) is already full of all sorts of toxic(ish) sort of waste and 2) is designed to keep this sort of toxic stuff from making it's way to the water supply.

my BF gets mad at me for having so many rx bottles around but IMO even if it is a "mess", if I end up being able to help someone out who would otherwise have to cold turkey off thier med, then it's worth keeping all these rx's around for the next few years until I have to throw them out in a way where they wont go directly into our water supply.

Keep in mind the level of toxins in the water could cause birth defects of "unknown origin", miscarriage, or inability to conceive. Due to the increased chance of birth defect when a woman is actually taking these drugs, one will never know how the water she drinks could affect her pregnancy.

Landfills might be one commenter's answer; but the fact remains this stuff is already in the water supply, which ends up in food on your table, and produce that you eat or grow at home.

One has to consider the waste by products of the manufacturing plants where these medications are processed as well.

The Feds may just have to start a Pharma-Superfund clean up project. Many homes that get water from wells, such as mine are most likely at high risk for contaminents. For example, I've recently had my water tested due to pesticide odor and taste. The water company came out and flushed the system, and they told me my street is a dead-end for their water supply, that often it stagnates and needs flushing due to junk build up.

Anyone watch the movie Erin Brochovich[sp]? and the scene where she offered the attorney's for the water company a glass of the city in questions water? and they didn't drink it? that movie is a true story, and this is the same problem, but ppl. won't see it that way until affected somehow. And you may never know how it affects your body, or children or pregnancy.

Pharma will down play this with "trace amounts not harmful" BS. Don't believe it.

Remember that many commonly prescribed and over-the-counter medications are toxic to animals (e.g. tylenol and cats). Let alone to humans. This is the kind of shit that makes me want to move far away from humans and their poisoned drinking water with a rifle and a bottle of Scottish whiskey and Ruby Ridge it. Civilization: ew.

These days, whenever I hear about a big dog attack, I wonder what's in the water dish.

foundation of a food pyramid
"Freshwater mussels exposed to tiny amounts of an antidepressant's active ingredient released premature larvae, giving the next generation lower odds of survival; in a separate lab study, the antidepressant also stunted reproduction in tiny fresh water mud snails.

When researchers slid hydras — a tiny polyp that under a microscope looks like a slender jellyfish — into water tainted with minute amounts of pharmaceuticals, their mouths, feet and tentacles stopped growing. While the hydras are minuscule, the implications are grave: Chronic exposure to trace levels of commonly found pharmaceuticals can damage a species at the foundation of a food pyramid. "
LINK

And, in Britain, Prozac was found to be in the water supply in 2004.

Actually that story was a fabrication.

Below is an email I sent to the Observer about it at the time (slightly redacted for privacy). I received no response. The story was never retracted.

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Prozac story fabricated
Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2004 00:25:01 +1000
From: michael
To:

Dear Mr Pritchard,

It would seem that Mark Townsend's August 8 story
"Stay calm everyone, there's Prozac in the drinking water" is pure fabrication.

There is no such report on the Environment Agency
website and nothing but an utter refutation on the DWI one.

As the article contained presumably invented quotes
from Andy Croxford of EA, Norman Baker of the LibDems
and an unnamed DWI spokesman it would seem to be
one of the more pernicious examples of journalistic fraud.
It not only brings the Observer into disrepute, but serves
to undermine the credibility of the excellent articles on
SSRIs written by Sarah Boseley of your sister publication
'The Guardian'.

I expect to see a retraction in full of the article in next
weeks Observer and hope that Mr Townsend will receive
some counselling about the ethics of journalism.

Michael
Sydney, Australia

michael, in my opinion this remains ignorant bliss.

michael, in my opinion this remains ignorant bliss.

Umm, Stephany, unless you've read the link provided to the DWI release you're throwing stones from a glass house here.

There are plenty of reasons for condemning SSRIs, but the notion that they are somehow contaminating our drinking water is not one of them.

The molecules breakdown readily in the environment into non-psychoactive, though not necessarily benign, byproducts (or at least SSRIs do - estrogen and its analogs are another matter).

But my primary point is that the 2004 UK story was a fake.

The EPA did *not* test drinking water.
They tested effluent.

They *did* test for the breakdown products of an unnamed SSRI, but it was not Prozac.

But I guess "SSRI Residues in Effluent" isn't as snappy a headline as "... Prozac in the drinking water".

Note that the AP article also refers to 'pharmaceuticals or byproducts' and 'pharmaceuticals or residues' - i.e. they don't distinguish between active drugs and inactive breakdown products.

And when you're talking 'parts per trillion' (the sensitivity of these tests) you'd have as much cause for concern if you are in the same room as someone who coughs after taking his Prozac.

I've been campaigning against SSRIs for almost eight years now and in my experience scare stories like this only - ahem - muddy the waters.

Lets leave the hyperbole and lies to the drug companies, shall we?

Should be a good week to buy shares in bottled water companies though.

I remain to choose to be informed with a broad view of the big picture regarding the entire eco-system, and there is no proof anywhere or long term study that any drugs found in this report cannot affect a human being, plantlife or animal which is all part of our food chain.

Ignorant bliss in my description means "un-informed happy to let the news just roll by".

I also have not condemned or created a debate re: SSRI's here, in this thread I am talking about ALL medications in the water, because there are more than psych meds there.

Until alarms sound such as they did w women being told not to eat fish in certain lakes in the US due to mercury, etc. this news will remain flat unless ppl. take notice with a broader thought that psychiatric medications.

Various kinds of drugs in the water, both psychiatric and other kinds of prescription drugs, are definitely having an effect on the fish in many places. Just today I read in my local paper another AP story about how medications are damaging fish in Lake Mead, near Las Vegas. Among the kinds of drugs mentioned were antibiotics and mood stabilizers. It also says that some non-aquatic animals, like vultures, suffer from medication-related damage (such as kidney failure). I guess these must be animals that feed on the fish that have some of the drugs in them.

Water treatment systems don't filter out drugs like these, so I guess they just keep on accumulating in reservoirs. I think water supplies that come from rivers might be less likely to have drug accumulations in them than those that come from stagnant sources. It's a problem that is probably likely only to get worse before anything much is done about it.

Sigh.

I guess this is what happens when people start believing they are well informed after reading mainstream press reports on science issues by non-science journalists.

The RGJ story says "Pharmaceuticals in the water are being blamed for severe reproductive problems in many types of fish: The endangered razorback sucker and male fathead minnow have been found with lower sperm counts and damaged sperm; some walleyes and male carp have become what are called feminized fish, producing egg yolk proteins typically made only by females."

There's not enough info in the article to say for sure, but I'd suggest that this is an example of the well documented effects of xenoestrogens entering the biosphere.

Some of those chemicals are coming from excreted birth control pill residue but the vast bulk of it comes from things like phytoestrogens - naturally occurring but increasing in the waterways due to the large amounts of unfermented soy now being consumed - and, more concerning, phthalates - the chemicals used to make plastic flexible and which leech into the contents of plastic containers and the environment.

Anyone here drink from flexible plastic bottles?
If so, you are consuming far higher concentrations of these sorts of chemicals than you will get out of your kitchen faucet. And of course stories like these will panic more people into buying water in plastic bottles (which trashes the environment as well as dosing you up on phthalates).

It is precisely because there is so much rubbish science journalism distracting people from *real* environmental concerns onto headline grabbing hypotheticals that I went to the trouble of pointing out that the 2004 UK article on Prozac in the water supply was a fake.

If bothering to do the research instead of accepting the latest moral panic the corporate media chooses to spoon feed me makes me 'ignorantly blissful', then I guess I plead guilty.

Ditto for choosing to focus on problems for which there is *evidence*, rather than demanding that governments or corporations prove a negative to refute claims made by journos who don't know what they're talking about or who just make up the 'facts', Judith Miller style.

Or should we be demanding that Lily and Pfizer prove that they don't have WMDs too?

wow michael, you are right the plastic is a problem with those water bottles, and so is most of the water inside of them sold at high prices.
thanks for the education, i need it.

I'm glad Judith is on book leave for 2 months. Now that she's not influencing me, what will I do?

Lilly wouldn't give an honest answer and have not ever, so why demand it of them now. Just my opinion.

Maybe it's time for Seroquench to enter the market, then we can all be happy.

So all the stuff in the water that has been reported as coming from various kinds of pharmaceuticals is actually from the effects of xenoestrogens - wow, I guess that really shows how wrong the common knowledge about this is. But we know there is something bad that human beings are putting in the water that causes these problems, don't we?

So maybe all the journalists and public officials are wrong when they explicitly say that many of the toxins they find in the water supply are residue from certain specific pharmaceuticals - I don't presume to know anything. But couldn't they possibly be right, also - at least partly right? It would seem to make sense that with all of the drugs being taken by people today, at least some of what's wrong with the water is a result of drug residue.

Not all potentially useful information is from things that can be known for sure. Can the kidney failure in vultures also be explained away as being caused by xenoestrogens? Maybe it can - what do I know? But presuming that absolutely all the damage to wildlife is caused by the effects of xenoestrogens until proven otherwise seems also to be "demanding that governments or corporations prove a negative".

But personally, I know I'm in no position to demand anything from governments or corporations. It seems probable that at least some of the observed damage is the result of drug residue in the water, though, and that maybe that is a significant indicator of how overused the drugs are throughout human societies. It's hard to understand how anyone would be so outraged at the suggestion of that as a possibility, unless they were a defender of pharmaceutical companies. But as I said before, what do I know?

basic water testing can show what's in water, so the media really can't hype anything skewed in my opinion, this is one time the data is probably correct if not worse than we imagine. pharma companies will want to down play this. I would rather assume the worst and hope for the best, but fact is stuff does contaminate water, affect human life and reproductive systems, and this is just another added dimension. acid rain exists, so does pollution in the air. i've got an article from 20 years ago stating some stats re: young ppl who died in their teens in smog-filled L.A. basin area and their lungs had lesions on them. Also, at UCI[Irvine]the carbon testing showed pollution in hair. I also had water tested in a 5 sq mile radius of my neighborhood when a "cluster" showed up of women complaining of different cancers. We lived near vegetable fields when pesticide residue was run-off.

My point is, I do not doubt what's in the water, I take it as fact and alarm, because usually we never know how bad things are until 3 legged frogs start to show up. Or the chickens w/out legs.

Stephany, I tend to think you are right about the water testing giving a fairly accurate picture of what is actually in the water, and about it maybe being even worse than we are currently aware. I can't imagine how anyone could honestly object to reporting the findings of such testing. But I know that people with vested interests in industries or companies that produce the products that cause the harmful byproducts which sicken everyone, like pharmaceutical companies, sometimes write in to blogs and other places passing themselves off as nothing but concerned citizens, when in fact their primary concern is to protect the reputation of the companies or industries that they have a vested interest in.

I can't imagine how anyone could honestly object to reporting the findings of such testing.

I have no objection to honestly reporting that sort of thing. But the Observer report I first posted about was no such thing - as you would know if you read the Department of Water Inspectorate release I linked to instead of closing your eyes and accusing others of 'blissful ignorance'.

The other reports are also, in my view, deliberately deceptive. They confound pharmaceutical traces with breakdown residues and juxtapose fish mutations with drug traces as if there is a link between the two - but provide no evidence. Try reading the story you linked to carefully, Kent.

Being critical of both sides of an argument is called .

Being critical of only one is called prejudice.

Swallowing whatever the media feeds you without any critical thought or fact checking whatsoever is called gullibility.

Last comment glitched.

The third last sentence should have read:

"Being critical of both sides of an argument is called skepticism."

But I guess skepticism is just for people with 'vested interests in industries or companies ...' - like the UK government authority charged with ensuring the safety of drinking water.

Corporate media outlets, of course, can be trusted implicitly and we don't have to worry about their company links and advertising revenue provided by drug and chemical companies who might have an interest in keeping the public focused on evidence-free scare campaigns and distracted from the many real concerns their products raise for which there is overwhelming evidence that the media does its best to ignore.

You seem to take personal offense at the reports of pharmaceuticals in public water supplies, Michael, and it's hard to understand why. Just because the report about Prozac in a British water supply may have been erroneous doesn't mean that every other report of pharmaceuticals in every other water supply is also wrong, and often in real life people have to act on information that indicates things are likely or probable without proving them absolutely. The main point of your arguments here seems to be that everyone else but you is shallow, jumping to false conclusions, not researching things enough, etc. You're not very convincing in that regards, but you do seem to be saying something about your own opinion of yourself. It also seems like you may be confounding me with Stephany - although the statement questioning the honesty of your objections was mine, it wasn't me who accused you of blissful ignorance.

I have read the story I linked to carefully. You're right that it doesn't absolutely prove every connection that it makes, but it does make some valid points. The connection between kidney failure in vultures with pharmaceuticals in the water, for example, does seem likely - I know some psychiatric medications have caused kidney failure in humans. It's not absolute proof, Michael, but medications are not defendants in a criminal court whose guilt has to be proven beyond any reasonable doubt before any action can be taken against them. If there is a likely threat to public health, than it may be best to try and do something to reduce that threat rather than waiting for absolute proof, by which time it may be a much bigger problem.

You seem to make a lot of assumptions about what other people think, Michael, but you don't really know what anyone else thinks unless they specifically tell you. It's possible to see things in shades of gray without insisting it be all one way or another, and it's possible for people to think critically and skeptically but still disagree with you.

You still haven't said what your personal interest in this is. I believe that most people who read and comment on this blog have had some personal experience as recepients of psychiatric treatment, but I haven't read anything that indicates what your background is. Somehow I get the impression that you come from a different background, but of course I don't really know. Maybe your motives would seem less dubious if you said a little about what your personal interest is in all this.

No Kent, I take personal offence at people who can't be bothered checking facts accusing me of 'ignorant bliss' for doing so.

I also take offence at snide inference that I am a corporate stooge because I choose to fight corporations from a basis of solid evidence rather than media hype.

And finally, I take offence at crap journalism that tries to manipulate the public into baseless moral panic. Which is a big part of the reason the concerned public is so tied up in trying to blame autism on immunisations or sick vultures on flushed Prozacs rather than coordinating a response to the real corporate abuses that are all around them every day.

The Observer report that Philip cited (via the BBC) was not in error. It was a bald faced lie aimed at producing the sort of headlines that sell tabloid newspapers. A bald faced lie that was never retracted and still has legs in the media.

The connection between kidney failure in vultures with pharmaceuticals in the water, for example, does seem likely.

Does it really?

Given the significant environmental pollution from pesticide and fertiliser runoff, the contamination of the North American ecosystem with GE organisms, the tainting of the waterways with non-pharmaceutical industrial chemicals at levels thousands of times higher than the few hundred parts per trillion detected for drugs and their residues and the fact that, unlike pharmaceuticals, many of these chemicals bioaccumulate up the food chain (concentrating in things like vultures and eagles - remember that most famous of xenoestrogens, DDT?) can you explain to me exactly how "There are problems with other wildlife as well: kidney failure in vultures" = "The connection between kidney failure in vultures with pharmaceuticals in the water, ... does seem likely".

I agree, if there is *any* evidence - not just proof beyond reasonable doubt - that pharmaceutical traces in the ecosystem are affecting people or wildlife it is certainly cause for concern, investigation and action. However I do not think that sensation seeking articles by scientifically illiterate journalists who simply juxtapose facts without even showing correlation, much less causality, constitutes evidence.

I'm not about to spout all the details of my background - and certainly not my medical history - on an open blog. But as it happens I neither work for nor own shares in *any* multinational corporation or pharmaceutical business of any kind. As it also happens, I have been involved in anti-corporate activist groups for over two decades and - as I already mentioned - have been campaigning against SSRIs (and antipsychotics) for almost a decade. I am also active in supporting forensic prisoners in their efforts to gain at least the level of human rights that convicted prisoners can expect (which is still way too low).

How about you Kent?

Well, Michael, when you make snide remarks like "I guess this is what happens when people start believing they are well informed after reading mainstream press reports on science issues by non-science journalists", and others like that which you have made in these comments, it can't be too unexpected if you eventually get a response that is similar in tone.

I am glad to see that you are not involved with the pharmaceutical companies, though. I suspected otherwise, but take your word for it that you are not.

I think I've actually said quite a few things about myself and indicative of my own personal background in previous comments over the past several months on this blog, which I have been reading for quite a long time. There doesn't seem to be any real chance of anything positive coming from further comments on this topic.

ignorant bliss is "without knowledge and happy" . so forget I said it. I clearly misread you michael, you are happy and well informed.

Yeah, you're right Kent.

I apologise for that crack about believing you're well informed from reading the media. It was the article that pissed me off and I reacted by taking potshots at the messenger.

The reference to the vultures in the article is particularly misleading, as there really are big problems with vultures on the subcontinent, due to medications used in cattle that they scavenge (not in the water supply). They aren't just suffering kidney disease, they are so severely decimated that the Parsis of Bombay can no longer carry out their traditional funeral rites whereby the dead are left out on the Towers of Silence to be picked clean. But that has nothing to do with the minute traces of pharmaceutical residues in US lakes.

Its not just what the writers put in to try to beat up the drugs-in-the-water hype, its what they leave out.

If you are going to start talking about harmful pharmaceuticals in livestock at therapeutic doses, why do you suppose they neglected to mention some of the prime examples a lot closer to home? Antibiotics in chicken feed for example. Or bovine somatotropin in cattle (outlawed in every developed country except the US).

Could it be that the corporate media isn't interested in informing people about the real dangers drug companies are exposing you to, and would prefer to keep you in a flap over non-issues?

So instead of arguing over what is being deliberately introduced into the environment and your food for the sake of $$$, they get people moralising at each other over the correct way to dispose of left over pills.

Who knows. If the corporations strike it lucky someone might even take this sort of 'science' into the courtroom in a civil case, where it will not only be slapped down with ease, it might even create more precedents like 'Daubert v Merrill Dow Pharmaceuticals'. Then it will be that much harder for people with real scientific evidence to get it accepted in court.