City Folk - Do You Know Where Your Drinking Water Comes From?

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An area print shop puts out a small weekly paper called Tidbits. Humor, etc. between ads. This item was in the most recent issue:

"An average glass of London tap water has passed through nine other people."

-- Ken S. in WC TN (scharabo@aol.com), November 20, 2000

Answers

Ken, disgusting, but true! :-) All water we drink here goes through a PUR brand water filter pitcher, well or county water! Cheap and efficient insurance. Annie in SE OH.

-- Annie Miller (annie@1st.net), November 20, 2000.

I read LA in CA was building a sewer treatment plant to recycle the water back into the drinking supply. This probably will happen more often in the future for water starved cities.

-- JLS in NW AZ (stalkingbull007@AOL.com), November 20, 2000.

One of the biggest "silent" pollutions in drinking water is pharmaceuticals. Think about it - where do you put old, outdated, or allergic-to medications? Down the toilet, of course, so the kids and animals won't dig them out of the trash. Waste treatment doesn't filter much of this out, as the molecules are generally quite small and clorine doesn't harm them, or else you'd be advised not to take them with tap water. Digitalin, insulin, cholesterol medications, beta blockers, hormones of all sorts and dosages, etc., etc., etc.

We all know that small amounts of harmful chemicals over a long period of time do great harm to the body. How about a heart patient taking his digitalin with tap water that comes from a watershed near a retirement facility full of heart patients. Or someone with hemophilia accidentally getting steady, low doses of coumadin, a blood thinner, in his or her drinking water. These are not "what if..." scenarios - it's happening as we speak and chances are that nothing untoward will be detected in tests because the amounts are so small.

Country folk - you're not free of risk. As a matter of fact, because well water is not received through waste treatment, chances are that the medications will be pulled into your well from the water table more quickly and thus more intact than those in water that sits for weeks at a plant getting churned and bombarded with chemicals and oxygenators. What meds are your neighbors on? Any chemo patients nearby on pill-type meds. Any heart patients, high blood pressure, diabetics? Septic tanks leach into the ground and thus into your water table. Think about it. What can you do? Can't rightly say, myself, except the old saw about the deeper the well the safer the water is probably your best guide. Mother earth will filter out most of the bad guys, but ther's not much hope if you have a shallow well in a relatively high-use watershed. Dig deep, filter well, and hope for the best. Any suggestions from the peanut gallery would be welcome!

-- Soni (thomkilroy@hotmail.com), November 20, 2000.


Back to the basics folks, the water you are drinking today was here when the dinasours were peeing in it. We only have so much water here on earth and it's recycled constantly. Remember the water cycle you studied in the fourth grade. The very worst thing that can get into our water - water table - are petroleum products. The natural things that get in the water, dirt, bacteria, etc. is naturally broken down and hopefully eliminated in the process of passing through the water cycle. Petroleum however stays in the water, is not broken down and builds up. It's so important not to allow gas, oil, etc to seep into the ground, everything that hits the ground ends up in our water. Sometimes I wonder how the modern water treatment plants can keep up with all the trash that ends up in the water. Also remember, there is only so much water, we cannot make more and the more you use the less available for everyone else. Have a good day!

-- Betsy Koehnlein (betsyk@pathwaynet.com), November 20, 2000.

Hey Ken! MY water has been run through HOGS! Course from the way I've seen some people live I believe the hogs would be a smite speck cleaner!!! Seriously--I installed a Reverse Osmosis System to clean out all that I can. Farm chemicals, petro and all the rest of those undesirable thingys are taken out but don't know about some of those drugs. Makes ya stop and thing jest a little. Matt. 24:44

-- hoot (hoot@pcinetwork.com), November 20, 2000.


All of our drinking water goes through an R.O. unit (reverse osmosis)!!! Sonda in Ks.

-- Sonda (sgbruce@birch.net), November 20, 2000.

Ken, And here I always drank whiskey and beer just because FISH pee'd in the water.

-- Jay Blair (jayblair678@yahoo.com), November 20, 2000.

Ken - Here in Western NY we have one of the Great Lakes. Namely Erie Lake and the water is said to be good for human consumption if treated by our local water treatment plant. Our game syllabus advises us to only eat one meal of fish caught in this lake a month. I guess that tells you a lot if you stop to think about it. We drink bottled spingwater from a local treatment plant. We even give that some serious thought. No other choice I guess. Take care.

-- Gerald S. Rozanski (Grozanski56@cs.com), November 21, 2000.

Thanks God for our Big Berky. You don't need electricity and you don't have to hook it up to a water supply. It's the filter the Red Cross uses. It filters out 99% of stuff. The water tastes great. There's too much chlorine in the water around here.

-- Cindy (atilrthehony_1@yahoo.com), November 22, 2000.

now i really like our well.

-- renee oneill{md.} (oneillsr@home.com), November 26, 2000.


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