|
Essential Oils |
Bella Mira Essential Oil Supplements
Essential Oil Information and Use
|
Chemical Free |
Chemical Free Body Care Products
|
Gluten Free |
Gluten Free Living and Recipes
|
Important Information |
Detoxification and Digestion Products
Save Your Computer Free Protection
|
Great Products |
|
FREE Wellness Tests |
Hormone Balance Test New Improved
.gif)
|
Contact Us |
Our Shopping Cart Is:
Free Samples w/$150 Order (when available)
Senators blast EPA over news of drugs in water 4-15-08
Agency criticized for letting public hear of issue from AP investigation
WASHINGTON - The Environmental Protection Agency was lambasted during a
Senate hearing Tuesday for allowing the American public to learn that traces of
pharmaceuticals are in much of the nation’s drinking water from an Associated
Press investigative series, not the federal government.
Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., who chairs the Senate Committee on Environment and
Public Works, angrily chided Benjamin H. Grumbles, EPA assistant administrator
for water, for the agency’s failure to require testing for drugs and for public
disclosure of test results.
“When a story like this breaks, why is it necessary for Sen. (Frank) Lautenberg
to call a hearing on this? Why aren’t you working on this night and day?” Boxer
asked. “The Associated Press did your work — and they’re telling us what’s in
the water.”
Story continues below ↓advertisement
Boxer set the critical tone in her opening remarks, when she praised the AP and
the U.S. Geological Survey, which has conducted extensive testing, for informing
the nation that “our water supplies can contain a mixture of pharmaceuticals.
Notice I didn’t thank the EPA.”
‘Expanding the scope’ of testing
Responding to the aggressive questioning in a packed hearing room, Grumbles
insisted the agency is not downplaying the issue.
“We’re very concerned. It does send a big red flag. We’re taking this very
seriously,” Grumbles testified. He said the EPA was “drastically expanding the
scope” of its monitoring of testing of drinking water across the nation.
“Your concern is not comforting. I can tell you that,” said Lautenberg, D-N.J.,
who chairs the Subcommittee on Transportation Safety, Infrastructure Security
and Water Quality. “Action is what we are trying to get.”
The subcommittee convened the hearing in response to a series last month by the
AP National Investigative Team that detailed test results showing the presence
of minute concentrations of drugs in drinking water in 24 major metropolitan
areas that serve 41 million Americans.
The AP’s five-month inquiry found that while water is screened for drugs by some
suppliers, they usually don’t tell customers they have found medication in it,
including antibiotics, anti-convulsants, mood stabilizers and sex hormones. The
stories also detailed the growing concerns among scientists that this pollution
is already adversely affecting wildlife, and may threaten human health.
Some of the witnesses cautioned against sinking a lot of money and resources
into regulating pharmaceuticals in drinking water before the health risks are
better understood. In addition, they pointed out there may be more pressing
concerns about other contaminants.
After Grumbles maintained that federal scientists were studying the issue of
drugs in water long before the AP series, Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., asked him
why most people hadn’t heard about the contamination.
All talk, no action?
“You’ve been doing all of this, but it really surprised a lot of us. It really
shouldn’t take a newspaper article to get the story out,” she said. “My concern
here is you talk a lot about potential (inclusion of drugs on regulated
contaminant lists) and things we can do. I’m concerned there hasn’t been enough
action.”
Grumbles was grilled on why water providers are not required to test for
pharmaceuticals, on why the EPA’s budget for testing of endocrine disruptors in
waterways has been slashed 35 percent and why the agency has not disclosed all
of its test results. Repeatedly, senators said they were not satisfied with his
responses.
In a letter to the subcommittee earlier this month, Grumbles said it would be
unreasonable and expensive to require such testing, given the uncertain risk to
humans.
In remarks prepared for his testimony, he seemed somewhat less reluctant.
“Some have argued that it does not make sense to monitor for pharmaceuticals in
water if there is limited information about the health effects at the
concentrations that could be detected,” his prepared remarks read. “We disagree.
Information about occurrence and health effects is complementary and should be
developed in tandem.”
However, in his actual testimony, Grumbles declined to commit to such testing by
water providers. “I think that they should disclose information that is useful
to the public.” Wondering if that meant raw data, he said, “I don’t know.”
Boxer answered back, “I’m talking about test results.”
Outside the hearing room, Grumbles said utilities should test their waters for
pharmaceuticals if they have the financial and technical resources.
Boxer also called on Grumbles to immediately release records sought this year by
the AP in a Freedom of Information Act request from a White House task force
that is supposed to be devising a federal plan to research pharmaceuticals in
the environment.
Earlier this week, the AP reported that the White House Office of Science and
Technology Policy group has missed its December deadline to produce a national
research strategy. In releasing about 70 pages of documents, a White House
lawyer told the AP another “10 inches worth” were being withheld.
“The White House is keeping its task force secret,” said Boxer, who urged the
Bush administration to “immediately release all of the records.”
She pressed Grumbles to produce the material within 10 days. He made no such
commitment.
After the hearing, Lautenberg said the EPA response was inadequate. “To me, it
represents a sleight of hand that we are familiar with here.”
In other testimony, the senators were joined in their call for more research by
Robert M. Hirsch, the USGS’s associate director for water.
“Whether or not there are adverse human health effects from cumulative lifetime
exposures to the low concentrations of complex mixtures of pharmaceuticals found
in the environment remains a research priority, particularly the effects on
sensitive subpopulations such as children, women of child-bearing years, the
elderly and people with suppressed immune systems,” Hirsch said.
In statements prepared for the hearing, drug industry representatives and
environmentalists disagreed on whether enough is known to assure the public that
water contaminated with minute concentrations of pharmaceuticals is safe to
drink.
Alan Goldhammer, a deputy vice president for regulatory affairs at
Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, said his organization has
researched the issue for years and found no problems. “In summary, there appears
to be no demonstrable risk to human health from detected concentrations of
pharmaceuticals in surface waters,” he said.
But Jennifer Sass, a senior scientist for the Natural Resources Defense Council,
disagreed.
“Although the human health impacts of these exposures to pharmaceuticals and
personal care products are poorly understood, what we do know is troubling. For
example, we know that widespread exposure to antibiotics is contributing to the
growth of bacterial resistance, and this problem is of grave concern,” she said.
Shane Snyder, research and development project manager at the Southern Nevada
Water Authority in Las Vegas, suggested the focus of research needs to shift
from the known to the unknown.
“The critical question we must address is not ’Do they exist?’ but rather, ’At
what concentration are these compounds harmful to human health?’ Only then can
we make intelligent, rational decisions that protect the health of this
country’s municipal water customers,” Snyder said in his remarks.
Comment:
Don't do anything about the problem except blame the messenger!