In the first nationwide study of human drugs in fish tissue, the EPA has determined that the fish caught near five major U.S. cities’ wastewater treatment plants contained pharmaceutical residues!!
These residues included medicines used to treat high cholesterol, allergies, high blood pressure, bipolar disorder and depression.
Scientists have linked pharmaceuticals with disturbing ecosystem changes. For example researchers demonstrated that the feminization of fish was associated with exposure to sewage effluent now known to contain ethinyl estradiol, the active ingredient in birth control pills. They found male carp and male trout producing vitellogenin, an egg protein usually found only in females.
If you have old prescriptions you need to get rid of take them back to your pharmacy – don’t dump them down the drain where they will eventually make their way into our waterways and oceans, (no matter how far you live from them!!).
For more info on prescriptions and our waterways click here.
