Pharmaceuticals In Our Water Supplies

One of the news articles included in last week's newsletter was about pharmaceuticals in our water supplies. There is little doubt that there are trace amounts of prescription drugs in our water bodies. The "official" EPA term for these products is PPCP. Pharmaceuticals and Personal Care Products as Pollutants (PPCPs) refers, in general, to any product used by individuals for personal health or cosmetic reasons or used by agribusiness to enhance growth or health of livestock. PPCPs comprise a diverse collection of thousands of chemical substances, including prescription and over-the-counter therapeutic drugs, veterinary drugs, fragrances, and cosmetics. PPCPs have probably been present in water and the environment for as long as humans have been using them. The drugs that we take are not entirely absorbed by our bodies, and are excreted and passed into wastewater and surface water. With advances in technology that improved the ability to detect and quantify these chemicals, we can now begin to identify what effects, if any, these chemicals have on human and environmental health. To date, scientists have found no evidence of adverse human health effects from PPCPs in the environment.

The topic of disposal of old medications came up recently with a water quality colleague of mine. He related the story of a health care worker who came to a home to remove the medication after a person had died from cancer. The worker gathered the pill bottles and headed to the bathroom. He indicated his instructions were to flush all the medications down the toilet. It seems we all have a lot to learn.

One thing we all can do now is to properly dispose of our old prescription drugs and start down the road to a solution. A success story is a drug take-back program headed up by Sheriff John Montgomery in Baxter County Arkansas. During an April take-back event held earlier this year, Sheriff's Investigators counted and weighed the pills that were dropped off using pill counters donated by Magee Pharmacy of Mountain Home, AR. The total number turned in were 143,383 pills, weighing 204.5 pounds!

Sampling of prescription pills turned in during 2010 event

To facilitate the consistent disposal of these drugs the Sheriff's Office uses a drug incinerator funded by Roller Funeral Home

Drug Incinerator - funded by Roller Funeral Home

There is also a secure drop box located at the Criminal Investigation Department Building to allow for drop-offs throughout the year.

Secure Old Medication Drop Box

While the Baxter County example may be extra-ordinary, most counties and cities have drug drop off locations. I would encourage everyone including the public, officials, regulators and water quality organizations to publicize the need to properly dispose of old medication and how the public can do so. While searching online on this subject, I found a very informative web site maintained by the state of Utah.

Congress recently passed the Secure and Responsible Drug Disposal Act of 2010 to give consumers a safe and responsible way to dispose of unused prescription drugs. Consumers currently seeking to reduce the amount of expired or unwanted prescription drugs in their homes have few disposal options, increasing the risk of drug abuse and poisonings. The Secure and Responsible Drug Disposal Act of 2010 seeks to reduce these risks by permitting individuals to deliver their unused medications to responsible state and private drug take-back programs. I did a search to find a list of collection sites and found that the U. S. Department of Justice, Drug Enforcement Administration is currently compiling a list of locations to drop off old medications. The web site states: "Collection Sites are currently being organized. The collection site search feature will be available as soon as enough collection sites are confirmed. This is expected to be no later than Wednesday, September 28, 2011 - 1PM."

Ozarks Water Watch is also going to do a local search for locations in the Upper White River Basin. We will then publish this list on our website. If you know of current drop-off locations, please email us at contact@ozarkswaterwatch.org.

Quote of the Week

Current News Articles

Urban Impacts On Phosphorus in Streams

ScienceDaily (Aug. 11, 2011) - Although phosphorus is an essential nutrient for all life forms, excessive amounts of the chemical element can cause water quality problems in rivers, lakes, and coastal zones. High concentrations of phosphorus in aquatic ecosystems are often associated with human activities in the surrounding area, such as agriculture and urban development. However, relationships between specific human sources of phosphorus and phosphorus concentrations in aquatic ecosystems are yet to be understood. 

Establishing these relationships could allow for the development, implementation, and evaluation of management strategies to reduce nutrient pollution. Scientists from Washington State University-Vancouver and the University of California-Davis have investigated the link between human sources of phosphorus and phosphorus concentrations in rivers draining into California's Central Valley. Agricultural activity and human population density data was used to estimate the annual input of phosphorus from human sources to watersheds in the Central Valley for the early 2000s. The scientists then compared these estimates with data on phosphorus concentrations in rivers draining the watersheds from 2000 to 2003. Results from the study were published in the August issue of the Journal of Environmental Quality.This study was funded by California SeaGrant, the US Geological Survey, and NASA.

The research revealed that the majority of phosphorus input from human sources was located in a very small area in most of the river basins studied. Additionally, estimates of phosphorus inputs from fertilizer and livestock manure, rather than phosphorus input from human sewage, better predicted dissolved forms of phosphorus in rivers than generic data on agricultural and urban land use types in watersheds. The form of phosphorus in rivers is important, as different forms can have different environmental impacts. (more)

To read more, Click HERE.

SAN FRANCISCO, CA, Aug. 16, 2011 -- State and federal officials have inked a new Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) for Lake Tahoe that provides a roadmap for restoring the lake's clarity. The agreement, signed by California Governor Edmund G. Brown, Jr., Nevada Governor Brian Sandoval and U.S. EPA Regional Administrator Jared Blumenfeld, charts a course for returning the lake to almost 100 feet of clarity within 65 years.

The water clarity of Lake Tahoe declined from a visibility level of 105 feet in 1967 to an all time low of 64 feet in 1997. Ten years of scientific study ascertained that fine particulate matter is the prime factor in diminished clarity at Lake Tahoe. Scientific analysis demonstrates that restoring lake clarity is possible if pollutant load reductions can be achieved in each of the four primary sources of these pollutants: urban stormwater runoff, forest runoff, stream channel erosion and atmospheric deposition.

The TMDL outlines measures to reduce each of these sources, with a focus on the urban stormwater runoff source, as it is both the greatest source and the best opportunity to control the pollutants. The TMDL calls for advanced and innovative controls to achieve the needed pollution reductions.