Business News and Information

Over the counter and prescription drugs are a common pollutant in the drinking water of at least 24 major metropolitan areas in the United States, according to an AP probe.

If I said, “For all the sedatives in their water New Yorker’s are sure uptight…wonder if that’s why the water’s brown,” well that would be an exaggeration of the facts and my opinion of New Yorkers, plus a silly diversion.

In their coverage, Yahoo! News said “the concentrations of these pharmaceuticals are tiny, measured in quantities of parts per billion or trillion, far below the levels of a medical dose.”

How the drugs (some of these must be illegal), wound up in the drinking supply is just how you imagined it. Humans use them, humans expel them, humans flush…the rest is time, chance, and lots of purification.

With Orange County implementing the use of sewer water through indirect potable reuse, or “toilet to tap,” it is possible there will be a higher concentration of drugs in the water in the coming years. In a brief post on The Lede, author Mike Nizza noted “none of the systems in wide use effectively remove pharmaceuticals.”