• We’re currently investigating an issue related to the forum theme and styling that is impacting page layout and visual formatting. The problem has been identified, and we are actively working on a resolution. There is no impact to user data or functionality, this is strictly a front-end display issue. We’ll post an update once the fix has been deployed. Thanks for your patience while we get this sorted.

Study/Research finds more drugs than anybody realized in our US drinking water

Page 2 - Seeking answers? Join the AnandTech community: where nearly half-a-million members share solutions and discuss the latest tech.
Capt Caveman said:
What is the percentage of these wastewater treatment plants that send their processed water back into their local drinking water supply?

I would think a study on water drinking sources would be more applicable.
Click to expand...

+1 for reading comprehension and agree that there is no real information here about our DRINKING water.

FWIW, EPA recently introduced regs for how hospitals, pharmacies, and med distributors dispose of waste meds. Now we just burn most of it. What will be the literal fallout from that decision?
 
Even with the EPA and numerous rules/regulations, we still have these problems. Imagine the Chinese people in China or folks in developing/poor countries.
 
The problem with distilled water is that it will leach minerals from the body. That's why some water purifying processes run the water through something that adds minerals at the end.
 
Scarpozzi said:
Don't kidd yourself. You get all the Moose piss that trickles down from Canada and Maine.

And the Seinfeld episode begs to differ. Remember Jerry and Kramer's hair after the lowflow shower heads?
Click to expand...


Great, now the Massholes know the truth about Poland Springs, thanks a bunch ya fucker! 😉
 
DAGTA said:
The problem with distilled water is that it will leach minerals from the body. That's why some water purifying processes run the water through something that adds minerals at the end.
Click to expand...

Correct, distilled has a slightly acidic pH. Creating an acidic environment in your body will lead to all kinds of problems too, not just a lack of calcium, magnesium, etc.
 
lozina said:
I've been distilling water at home since 2001 for all drinking and cooking. It does absolutely get rid of all that crap in the water, just pure H2O.
Click to expand...

Uhhhh no, not really. Just because water might not have dissolved solids doesn't mean it's pure H20. Distillation removes things based on their boiling point, so anything synthetic that shouldn't be there and that has a lower boiling point than water (which is most of them IRC) goes right along with the water vapor to condense. I hear you can mitigate it greatly with carbon filters though, but the fact remains a lot of that crap distillation gets rid of you actually kinda need. I think it's telling that distilled water exists nowhere on this planet naturally.

Not trying to pick on distillation. The synthetic stuff gets through reverse osmosis too. Most it is composed of molecules smaller than H20.

"Pure H20" is a bit of a figment, unless we're talking precise laboratory conditions anyway.

I have my own well, so I worry about MTBE and others. Just purchased a second whole house Aquasana system for my new digs. My last one was excellent. Our water tasted great and it reduced the mineral content enough to save me from having to consider one of those water softener/vegetation destroyer setups.
 
lozina said:
Didn't realize all these pharmaceutical drugs have been around for centuries
Click to expand...

Sure they were. If a birch tree fell in a lake and you drank the water then you could get rid of your headache, right?

The story is suspect because it talks of arbitrary levels of parts per billion then comes up with the ridiculous comparison with estrogen. The problem isn't estrogen but so many substances have estrogen like qualities which screw things up big time. Only someone ignorant of the facts would blame pharmaceuticals for that, which the writer of the article shows herself to be.

There needs to be research continuing, but for the time being you going to run screaming if someone tosses an aspirin into a swimming pool?

Another attempt to scare up readership, written by the ignorant for the ignorant.
 
I heard about this before, how the drugs are in the urine and end up back in the water supply. What bothers me more about that is the fact that the plants arn't filtering the urine all that well if some of the stuff in the urine does not get filtered out.

What else is making it in, besides urinated drugs? :hmm:
 
kage69 said:
Correct, distilled has a slightly acidic pH. Creating an acidic environment in your body will lead to all kinds of problems too, not just a lack of calcium, magnesium, etc.
Click to expand...

Distilled water can be acidic if it's exposed to the air long enough where it'll gradually dissolve CO2 in the air to produce carbonic acid.
If you drink it right away without this exposure, I don't see any reason it'd be acidic.

As for the mineral content of mineralized water being crucial for its nutritional value, I don't see how your diet isn't sufficient for this. Two liters of very hard water (the typical person consumes two litres of water per day) with 17 gpg of hardness will only contain about 232 milligrams (mg) of calcium. This is about 10 percent of a person's minimum daily requirement for calcium and would require a person to consume about 20 litres of water to meet their requirement by water alone. Most of a person's total dietary mineral intake comes from food.
 
yhelothar said:
Distilled water can be acidic if it's exposed to the air long enough where it'll gradually dissolve CO2 in the air to produce carbonic acid.
If you drink it right away without this exposure, I don't see any reason it'd be acidic.

As for the mineral content of mineralized water being crucial for its nutritional value, I don't see how your diet isn't sufficient for this. Two liters of very hard water (the typical person consumes two litres of water per day) with 17 gpg of hardness will only contain about 232 milligrams (mg) of calcium. This is about 10 percent of a person's minimum daily requirement for calcium and would require a person to consume about 20 litres of water to meet their requirement by water alone. Most of a person's total dietary mineral intake comes from food.
Click to expand...

The body has a buffering system and drinking water from a reverse osmosis system is completely safe. Water isn't a significant source of minerals, and if anything we consume too much sodium and we could lower our sodium levels. That isn't true, but it sounds good 😉

I have an RO unit at home and use it, and one at my job so I drink it almost exclusively. Beats the taste of chlorine.
 
Lol the quantities are so miniscule it shouldn't make any difference. I gotta start drinking more water, it will lower my bp...who knew!
 
5150Joker said:
Lol the quantities are so miniscule it shouldn't make any difference. I gotta start drinking more water, it will lower my bp...who knew!
Click to expand...

It's fairly obvious that many of the things humans produce are adversely affecting the environment. The increase in asthma for instance are most likely due to environmental exposures of pollutants, and estrogen like substances produced industrially create havoc. PCB's? Let's just pretend we never heard of those. There are some serious issues out there. How do we respond? By creating a tempest in a teapot over issues which have no known problems, linking them to those which do, and ignoring the things of significance.

For example there's this little bit Something like that? Let's not worry. Someone might grow poppies next door and that's so scary.
 
Hayabusa Rider said:
At least as good a one as those stirring up trouble based on ignorance, and if you ask, yes I am qualified. How about you?
Click to expand...

Nope, but then again I haven't made a single claim or suggestion in this thread. I wasn't even talking to you, champ, so try not to get your saddle in such a bunch.

Maybe you got confused over which account you were logged into?
 
BikeJunkie said:
Nope, but then again I haven't made a single claim or suggestion in this thread. I wasn't even talking to you, champ, so try not to get your saddle in such a bunch.

Maybe you got confused over which account you were logged into?
Click to expand...



Sorry, but these threads are annoying and worse these "news" stories are less than useless The levels that have been detected have never been seriously seen as a problem but you'd think the world was on fire. 5150 and I often disagree, but he happens to be correct in this case. Ongoing research should and will happen, however one ought to have a reasonable basis for panicking. Until then we should be focusing on things which are demonstrably problematic.
 
Hayabusa Rider said:
Sorry, but these threads are annoying and worse these "news" stories are less than useless The levels that have been detected have never been seriously seen as a problem but you'd think the world was on fire. 5150 and I often disagree, but he happens to be correct in this case. Ongoing research should and will happen, however one ought to have a reasonable basis for panicking. Until then we should be focusing on things which are demonstrably problematic.
Click to expand...

:thumbsup:
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

TRENDING THREADS

Back
Top