Q&A: Water on drugs -- What to do?

Thanks to the recent drugs in drinking water news, I'm getting a whole bunch of tap water-related questions about yesterday's post. Here they are, along with my answers.

Question: Are you sure tap water is better??? CNN doesn't seem to agree. I cant' stand the smell nor the taste of tap-water. Maybe it is different in California, but it wasn't different in NC, FL, GA or MI (all places where I have lived). Mike

Answer: I often have the sneaking suspicion that most naysayers to my posts don't actually read the articles they email me -- beyond the headline, that is. Mike, you are one of the people proving my suspicions correct. Here's a direct quote from the CNN link you kindly sent me:

Even users of bottled water and home filtration systems don't necessarily avoid exposure. Bottlers, some of which simply repackage tap water, do not typically treat or test for pharmaceuticals, according to the industry's main trade group. The same goes for the makers of home filtration systems.

Your question does, however, bring up a more important issue about the research, regulations, and news surrounding water. Tap water's much more heavily researched, regulated, and written about than bottled water is -- so we get huge headlines about how tap water contains this or that danger fairly frequently. This tends to create the illusion that tap water's dangerous -- which gets a lot of people to assume bottled water's the safer solution -- which is very far from the truth.

I do wish that the mainstream media would stop screaming out the potential dangers tap water in the headline and burying the same bad news about bottled water in like paragraph 30....

On the taste front: Our tap water here's won taste awards, so it is quite possible that my water's better than your water. Sorry dude.

Question: Does a reverse osmosis filter take out these pharmaceutical molecules in water? Thanks!!! Nancy from New Jersey.

Answer: Yes. Although most home filtration systems -- as mentioned in the quote above above -- do not remove these pharma concoctions, reverse-osmosis filters do. Here's a quote from a more detailed AP article on AOL:

One technology, reverse osmosis, removes virtually all pharmaceutical contaminants but is very expensive for large-scale use and leaves several gallons of polluted water for every one that is made drinkable.

Question: I have in front of me the May 2007 Consumer Reports article on water filters. They mention that reverse-osmosis filters are "extremely slow and creates 3 to 5 gallons of waste water for every gallon filtered." How do we get the benefits of reverse-osmosis without wasting so much water. Clean water is a priority, but isn't conserving water just as important? Best, Scott

Answer: Good point, Scott -- especially as it's one I pointed out in the original post you're responding to:

Reverse-osmosis filters do, however, tend to have a higher up-front cost -- and as the NRDC points out, "wastes a substantial amount of water during the filtration process."

Then I went on to discuss less water-intensive filter options. But in any case -- This IS a question I wrestle with personally. Yes, the water waste is a concern -- and in general, I encourage people to conserve water. On the other hand, I do know definitively that there are traces of arsenic and pharmaceuticals in L.A.'s water. I also know that many people erroneously turn to bottled water, thinking it's safer, unaware that this bottled water too can contain the exact same contaminants.

Considering those constraints, I personally think it's better to let people know both the up and downsides of different filtration systems and let them decide what's best for themselves, as opposed to coming down with a "everyone must use X type of filter" rule.

But in case you're curious, I use a Brita filter.

Question: Now I'm wondering about the residual pharmaceuticals in tap water. The L.A Times doesn't seem to have an article about it on their website, but the Washington Post has one on theirs. And how exactly are we supposed to dispose of said pharmaceuticals in a green manner? I know I'm not supposed to flush them or put them in landfills, but when I asked my local pharmacy, I was told, "Oh, just put them in the trash." So what's the right answer, and how do I actually execute it? Kate

Answer: California actually has a "No Drugs Down the Drain" public outreach program to let you know how to get rid of your unwanted meds. Here's the handy disposal guide: Basically, you can take it to one of the hazardous waste facilities around the city -- or just properly seal the stuff before throwing it in the trash.

But I do  want to mention that flushed meds are actually not the main cause of our pharma-water conundrum. The bigger problem is simply that a lot of people are taking meds -- and pooping them out. As Umbra of grist points out, "an important companion to responsible waste disposal is using the fewest medicines necessary for your health."

Photos by Jay Wilson , Joe Philipson , J. P. Anderson, all via Flickr;image courtesy of Food and Water Watch

Comments

[m]

To me one of the bigger issues with this water thing (which I am not sure why this is a surprise since I know I had come across this info in the past), is how concentrated it will end up in our food supply, like other toxic elements we introduce into our environment, such as pesticides. So if someone grows food and waters it with this water over and over and over again, do the veggies and fruits end up with pharmaceutical residuals as well? What about animals? Is this something to consider when we decide to eat locally grown foods opposed to ones shipped in from some far away location? Are we going to continually make the supply more and more concentrated as people take more and more medications without cleaning them from the water? Maybe this isn't a concern because some of these residues finally break down over time or when exposed to certain things?

[sadie]

I googled some of the big words that they found in the water and yikes, what a lot of information.

What the people flush into the toilets, pour down the drains and put on the soil is in the tap water.

So what is this doing to the living beings drinking this water? For example there are interactions and if that trace amount is in the water what is it gonna do to the patient taking meds that have interactions with the chemicals in the tap water? Another example is the trace amounts of antibiotics; is that why mrsa and stuff like that happened... because we are ingesting tiny amounts of the antibiotic and then the staph we acquire becomes immune to it because of repeated tiny exposures? What about all the illegal drug users, is their drugs in the tap water too and it's just not being said? What about pets and wildlife taking tiny amounts of random various drugs -pharma or otherwise, what do you think will happen; to people and animals? This is so freaky. We need a captain planet to come and help or give us advice or something even. wow.

[Danny]

For me, the reason bottled water tastes better than tap is that the bottled water is usually chilled, grabbed from a shelf in the fridge, while tap isn't. The solution, of course, is put a pitcher of tap in the fridge!

I will admit that the water in Indianapolis, where I lived for 3 1/2 years, took some getting used to. It had a musty, muddy smell to it. Local flavor, I guess.

[arduous]

Okay, I was excited that there was a way to properly dispose of this stuff in LA. I went to the website, and where it says click here for schedule for the hazardous waste collection, I clicked on it and NADA.

Why is it SO HARD LA?! Why can't you just designate a specific place once every few weeks. Or update your darn website and make sure the link works properly.

[MamaBird]

Thanks so much for this post. I have been trying (unsuccessfully) all day to get someone to answer the very question you took on: which filtration systems actually get rid of the pharma drugs? We just switched back from bottled to tap recently (my phobia of hermaphrodite babies was allayed by a kind scientist) so I was more than a little annoyed to see the press on pharma to say the least. I did know that bottled would be no better, but wasn't sure where that left me in terms of keeping my kids safe. Not sure we will go the reverse osmosis route but it's good to know it is a possibility. BTW, someone on a local parenting listserv had heard that a standard charcoal filter would get rid of pharma (ie brita). Untrue? Tx.

[Kate]

It seems that activated charocol adsorbs some pharms, I guess it depends on the molecular structure:
http://www.liebertonline.com/doi/abs/10.1089/ees.2006.0279

[Kevin Fretz]

It just amazes me to hear about our government asking people not to dump pharmaceuticals down the toilet.
California actually has a "No Drugs Down the Drain" public outreach program to let you know how to get rid of your unwanted meds.

What they have failed to mention is, that all these drugs are excreted in human waste that is on it's way to being sread in your local parks, school yards or land applied to farm land as fertilizer. Industry proponents are working hard to pass legislation to allow our food to be grown in this stuff!

After they compost this goop, they call it bio solids so the public doesn't know what is is. . You can even buy it in your local garden centers. Assocaited Press reports that a farmer in Georgia had 300 hundred of his cows die and has contaminated over 1700 acres of land with this same drug ridden stuff. A federal judge has ruled in his favor! California needs to wake up and smell the poop, if they really want to clean up their water!

[Kate]

"Another example is the trace amounts of antibiotics; is that why mrsa and stuff like that happened... because we are ingesting tiny amounts of the antibiotic and then the staph we acquire becomes immune to it because of repeated tiny exposures?"

It can't help, but the more obvious cause is that, as a society, we take far too many antibiotics that we don't need, for things they won't cure. But that's another topic.