Vitamins are certainly essential for the human body, however, not as great for water supplies. According to the EPA in the United States, a significant amount of unregulated pharmaceuticals is found in the country’s water supplies.
In a situation like this, you must be aware of how to get remove pharmaceuticals from water. Here’s what we have to tell you…
How To Get Rid Of Pharmaceuticals From Your Drinking Water
Pharmaceuticals in your drinking water are never a good idea and you must get rid of them in the best possible way. But the truth is that the US still hasn’t been able to do much about it.
However, we must tell you that it’s not all gloomy. There are a handful of ways for solving this problem of pharmaceuticals in drinking water on your own. Several national agencies have prepared a beneficial instruction guide of several water filtration methods that are very much effective in getting rid of pharmaceuticals.
Individuals who are too bothered by their degree of susceptibility to the arising contaminants in their drinking water can initiate some steps on their own.
Two of the water filtration methods provided by the agencies are nanofiltration and reverse osmosis. Both of these methods have been verified for removing pharmaceuticals up to 99.9% which is outstanding!
You can get any decent water filter for your home that has the capabilities of discarding pharmaceuticals as well as a different range of other pollutants that can pose possible threats to the human body.
Do your homework: Research
You need to conduct proper research on your own. If you wish to pick the water filter for the whole house or even a normal water filter for filtering drinking water, you must check if it has the logo of either the IAPMO or the NSF. The NSF sets certain standards and examines clean water and other consumer commodities available in the market of the United States.
If your product is certified with the logo of IAPMO or the NSF, this gives a great amount of assurance that your water filter works exactly as it advertises. Therefore, you can relax and have safe and pure water conveniently in your homes.
How Pharmaceuticals Enter Into Your Water
First, let’s see how these pharmaceuticals enter into your water. The truth is urine is merely one way through which pharmaceuticals enter into water supplies and there are plenty more.
When you will understand the process of water treatment, you will get to know who’s the culprit. The water that is supplied to your houses is initially taken from various water sources such as lakes, rivers, streams, and reservoirs.
After that, several chemicals such as chloramines and chlorine are used for its disinfection and this water undergoes the process of filtration. Eventually, it gets supplied to your house taps through the city pipeline.
Many people believe that their wastewater is entirely safe as it had undergone treatment before, that is not true. The ongoing process of water treatment doesn’t include any step where pharmaceuticals are removed.
Some more ways through which pharmaceuticals can enter into your water include illegal use of drugs, veterinary use of drugs such as steroids or antibiotics, agricultural products, hospital residue, as well as various day-to-day activities such as bathing, brushing, shaving, or swimming.
The central government has been attempting to indulge and aid the municipalities in dealing with this problem. For instance, the FDA has initiated a program for mitigating people’s actions of flushing their medicines in their toilets.
Along with it, they have prepared a specific list of all those drugs that are adequate for flushing. However, they certainly need to address some more strategies.
How Do Pharmaceuticals Affect Human Beings
First and foremost, we must mention that the majority of the concentrations of meds are almost trivial. However, certain pharmaceuticals that have been seen in water supplies were in increased concentrations.
The outcomes of these pharmaceuticals in the long term are presently anonymous and remain unexamined. Officials say that they don’t want to unnecessarily shock people in a way that people end up giving up on drinking their tap water altogether.
They expect individuals to be patient as this is not their call but the government’s. The government is still in the process of conducting more studies and examining the health effects of pharmaceuticals in drinking water.
However, one must always remain on the safer side. According to WHO, the current method used for wastewater treatment by municipalities is insufficient.
Currently, they don’t make use of any procedures that work to get rid of pharmaceuticals from the drinking water supply.
It is important to note that some highly advanced methods of water treatment such as photolysis, ozonation, or ultrasound are only efficient in getting rid of pharmaceuticals from 20-60%.
Conclusion — How to Remove Pharmaceuticals From Water
Pharmaceuticals in drinking water can have some very bad effects on the human body and must be avoided at all costs. Invest in a good water filter that works to remove meds and only drink safe and healthy water. Remember that one must never compromise on the water that they drink.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Are kids, pregnant ladies, or elder people more vulnerable to the possible outcomes of pharmaceuticals in the water supplies?
Although babies, toddlers, and even fetuses are slightly more vulnerable to ecological threats as their organs are still in the process of development. Moreover, they don’t have the well-built system of detoxification that we grown-ups have. For elder people too, their systems weaken over time.
Hence, it might be safe to say that they may be a little more vulnerable to the possible impacts of pharmaceuticals on the water supply.
Will boiling my tap water remove all the medicines present in it?
Unfortunately, just boiling your tap water wouldn’t suffice. Boiling does kill a lot of impurities, however, pharmaceuticals aren’t one of them.
Is bottled water free of pharmaceuticals?
If you think switching to bottled water will solve your problem with pharmaceuticals, you are highly mistaken. According to a report by NRDC, the water source for 25% of the bottled water is tap water itself.
