Traces of Prescription Drugs Found in Southland Aquifers

Cleansed so thoroughly that it is considered pure enough to drink, this flow from the Whittier Narrows reclamation plant meets all government standards. Yet county officials now report that they have found some potent -- and until recent months undetected -- ingredients in the treated waste: prescription drugs.

As new technology enables detection of infinitesimally smaller doses of chemicals in the environment, Southern California water-quality officials have learned that an array of hardy pharmaceuticals are defying even the most sophisticated sewage treatments in use.

Around the world, waterways and groundwater basins are virtual drugstores, awash in low doses of hundreds of prescription drugs excreted by people and flushed down drains.

Wherever there is sewage, there are traces of whatever pills people have popped: antibiotics and antipsychotics, birth-control hormones and beta blockers, Viagra and Valium.

"There is no place on Earth exempted from having pharmaceuticals and steroids in its wastewater," said Shane Snyder, head toxicologist at Las Vegas' water provider, the Southern Nevada Water Authority, and one of the nation's leading experts on pharmaceuticals in water. "This is clearly an issue that is global, and we're going to see more and more of these chemicals in the environment; no doubt about it."

Locally, small amounts of medicines for depression, seizures, high cholesterol, anxiety, infections, inflammation and pain -- among other ailments -- have been detected in the wastewater that flows into California streams and seeps into drinking-water aquifers. The contamination raises questions about the safety of reclaimed water consumed by the public and the health of wild creatures that inhabit waterways.

The concentrations are so minuscule -- in parts per trillion, or a few drops in an Olympic-sized swimming pool -- that scientists suspect there is little or no human danger. They acknowledge, however, that no one knows the effects of ingesting tiny doses of multiple drugs continuously over a lifetime.