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The tap
water contamination comes from agricultural runoff, household chemicals, and everything in between. Use of 80,000 low-level synthetic chemical comes at a tremendous price...increases in
degenerative disease.
In the early 1900s,
before the prevalence of chlorine,
pesticides, herbicides, and the tens of thousands of other chemicals that we
are now exposed to every day, the average American had a 1 in 50 chance of
getting cancer. Today, one out of three people can expect to get cancer in
their lifetime, one out of two males.
We can now find traces of low-level SOCs (synthetic organic chemicals) in virtually every public water
supply around the world. A recent report by the Ralph Nader Study Group,
after a review of over 10,000 documents acquired through the Freedom of
Information Act, confirmed that "U.S. drinking water contains more than 2,100 toxic
chemicals that can cause cancer."
There is no "new" water! Our planet reuses the same water
over and over. As our use of SOCs increases, so does the toxicity of our
water. Earth's natural filtration process is not effective at removing these
toxic SOCs, nor is municipal water treatment. Industry, agriculture, and
individuals all contribute to the problem. Many of the contaminants found in
water can be traced back to improper or excessive use of ordinary compounds
like lawn chemicals, gasoline, dry-cleaning solvents and cleaning products.
Once we realize that
everything that goes down the drain, on our lawns, on our agricultural fields, or into the environment by any means eventually winds up in the water we
drink, we begin to see just how vulnerable our water supply really is.
City water
treatment facilities do not remove SOCs. For the
most part, today's water treatment facilities are much the same as they were
at the turn of the last century: they filter out most of the visible particles and
add bleach!
"Drinking water plants
are old and out of date, and water supplies are increasingly threatened by and
contaminated by chemicals and microorganisms.," Natural Resources Defense Council.
"The way we guarantee
safe drinking water is broken and needs to be fixed," Carol Browner,
U.S. EPA chief.
One of America's leading
authorities on water contamination, Dr. David Ozonoff of the Boston University School of Public
Health states, "The risk of disease
associated with public drinking water has passed from the theoretical to the
real."
Many illnesses that
in the past could not be linked to a probable cause have now been linked to
toxins in our drinking water.
"While
levels of these carcinogens (SOCs) in drinking water are low, it is precisely
these low levels that carcinogenists believe to be responsible for the
majority of human cancers in the U.S.,"
U.S. Council on Environmental Quality.
The use of
pesticides and herbicides has become so excessive that they are now commonly
found in household tap water and bottled water.
A 1998 study of 29
major U.S. cities by the Environmental Working Group found that all 29 cities
had traces of at least one weed killer in the drinking water. The report
titled "Weed Killers by the Glass" went on to say that "millions of Americans are routinely
exposed to one or more pesticides in a single glass of tap water."
These first ever tap
water testings found two or more pesticides in the drinking water of 27 of
the 29 cities, three or more in 24 cities, four or more in 21 cities, five or
more in 18 cities, six or more in 13 cities, and seven or more in the tap water
of five major U.S. cities. In Fort Wayne, Indiana, nine
different pesticides were found in a single glass of tap water!
As a startling side
note, it was reported that in these 29 cities, 45,000 infants drank formula
mixed with tap water containing weed killers and that "over half of these infants were
swallowing four to nine chemicals in every bottle!"
The tragic health
effects of consuming these highly toxic chemicals are magnified many times
over for small children because their systems are more sensitive and still
developing. Small children also consume a much larger volume of fluids per
pound of body weight and therefore get a bigger dose, yet none of these
factors are considered when the EPA's maximum contaminant levels are set. The
National Academy of Sciences issued a report in 1993 on this subject, stating "children are not little
adults"and their bodies are less developed and simply
incapable of detoxifying certain harmful compounds.
Another major flaw
in the estimated risks of chemicals in our drinking water is the false
assumption that only one chemical is being consumed. The regulations are set
based on what is assumed safe for a 175-pound adult drinking water with only
one chemical present and do not take into account the combined toxicity of
two or more chemicals.
In a 1995 Science Advisory
Report to the EPA, it was stated that "when two or more of these contaminants combine in our
water, the potency may be increased as much as 1,000 times!"
It has been shown
that areas with the highest levels of SOCs in their water supplies also have
the highest incidence of cancer.
Jacquelyn Warren of
the Natural Resources Defense Council commented on the subject, "The one thing we know for sure about
toxins in our drinking water is that the more we look, the more we
find."
Find out what's in your
water.
Learn
the facts about bottled water and home water filtration. Which is best?
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