Flush away!

I thought I would pass along some very pertinent information I received in a monthly newsletter from a holistic nurse.


The holidays are officially over. For me it means putting away decorations and donating unused items to the local thrift store. As I go through my home I also make sure to check the medicine cabinet. Any medicine that has expired of any unused prescriptions will go.

The problem is we have been told in the past to flush medicine down the toilet. A study found 24 major metropolitan areas to have contaminated drinking water. This is affecting 41 million Americans.

So what types of drugs are we exposed to? The most common are antibiotics, anti-seizure medicine, mood stabilizers and sex hormones or birth control pills. Flushing is the only part of the problem. The ingested medicines are excreted through urine and feces. Sewage treatment facilities can not remove pharmaceutical waste. They are simply passed on to us and the rest of the environment$.

What can we do? Obviously we can't tell people to stop taking their medicine. Bottled water isn't necessarily the answer since 25% comes from the tap.

The EPA has advised everyone to stop flushing unused prescriptions and non-prescription medications.

Home filtering systems will decrease some of the medicine in your tap, but it has to be reverse osmosis or an activated charcoal system.

So what do we do with expired or unused medicine? Mix the medicine with coffee grounds or kitty litter and place in a seal-able bag or can. Check with your local pharmacy to see if they have a take-back program. Be informed, contact your local water authority and find out what they are doing about this situation.

Hopefully if we all stop flushing and pouring our medicine down the drain we can decrease the amount we are exposed to. Do your part.



Newsletter posted with permission. Visit this link to view her site.