World's highest drug levels entering India stream

When researchers analyzed vials of treated wastewater taken from a plant where about 90 Indian drug factories dump their residues, they were shocked. Enough of a single, powerful antibiotic was being spewed into one stream each day to treat every person in a city of 90,000.

And it wasn't just ciprofloxacin being detected. The supposedly cleaned water was a floating medicine cabinet — a soup of 21 different active pharmaceutical ingredients, used in generics for treatment of hypertension, heart disease, chronic liver ailments, depression, gonorrhea, ulcers and other ailments. Half of the drugs measured at the highest levels of pharmaceuticals ever detected in the environment, researchers say.

Those Indian factories produce drugs for much of the world, including many Americans. The result: Some of India's poor are unwittingly consuming an array of chemicals that may be harmful, and could lead to the proliferation of drug-resistant bacteria.

news.yahoo.com...

This is a disaster. I can only guess at the negative repercussions of this - both for humanity and for the planet itself. (drug resistance bacteria being just one of the negatives). India has what percentage of the worlds population? I dont even know what to say after reading this, i may need some time to digest this...

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[edit on 2/18/2009 by Badge01]

one has to wonder what positive repercussions as well though, ..

all I have to say though is money sucks, because if it didn't cost them money to "filter" it and dispose of it properly that I'm sure they would filter and dispose of it properly.

I'm just amazed that with a population larger than the US and Canada that the local public hasn't done something about it themselves, but I think that's where being easier to kill and easier to kill others has something to do with that.

I'm sure this is just one small instance of this happening on this planet.
There has to be other companies doing worse damage that we aren't hearing about, I think the public is to blame, that we don't create our own agencies and make our own groups that monitor things, who cares about government anymore, it's time people did things on their own for the right causes now.

This is terrible news. In working at a biochemical company, one of the first things I'd asked is where the chemical waste goes. We have a lime pit that goes through a natural filtration process, then pre-treatment, and then it goes to the wastewater treatment plant. The U.S. regulations are tight and for good reason! I live in this area and wouldn't want to drink anything tainted with the antibodies/enzymes/antibiotics/other materials we work with here. It's a classic example of how we irresponsibly export/accept cheap overseas production. China is getting hit with pollution, India is suffering from drugged water. Not good at all. I know why banks and IT are over there, but for food processing and medicine it completely baffles me. This is a stone thrown into the pond that will radiate outwards.

[edit on 27-1-2009 by saint4God]

Worlds highest drug levels entering most peoples bodies every saturday night.

I'm not sure drinking too much alcohol or willingly taking recreational drugs is a fair comparison to drugging the unknowing public with a hodgepodge of unknown chemicals (crossreactivity is a factor too) that can cause vomitting, kidney failure, fainting, or worse.

[edit on 29-1-2009 by saint4God]