In my article yesterday on the Toowoomba recycled water vote, I wrote:
The No campaign is being widely reported as scaremongering tosh, with groups such as “Citizens against drinking sewage”? playing up all sorts of urban myths and emotive lines. It’s also been alleged that No campaigners were associated with spreading defamatory and bizarre rumours. There was a whispering campaign about Mayor Di Thorley’s sexuality and business plans. And apparently everyone knows that drinking recycled water makes blokes grow boobs and shrinks their fishing tackle.
We don’t have to guess any further at the source of the latter rumours, it appears.
PEOPLE should not be forced to risk “feminisation” by drinking recycled sewage, says Queensland Opposition Leader Lawrence Springborg.
Outlining the case against treated effluent being added to southeast Queensland’s water supply, Mr Springborg said he was concerned that hormones left in the water could cause “changes to the basic metabolism of species”.
“There are unanswered questions about it,” Mr Springborg said. “This is particularly with female hormones, both artificial and also natural … Research into hormones and the effect that is having on the feminisation of fish and other animals that actually drink water – and also potentially humans – it is a highly emotion-charged debate.
Did I not hear the Borg make the claim on Radio National on Monday, that if he was elected leader of Queenslandia, there would be no water shortage?
I think he is planning to sacrifice virgins to the Rain God.
This is a pretty dumb comment but I too have heard such things. i.e. the end-product of recycled water still has oestrogen and other hormones in it (from those who take the pill or HRT) as the filtration system can’t yet get rid of them.
Does anyone have any evidence to the contrary. It’s been known to cause problems with sex ratios in fish habitats in the UK. Whether or not it has danger’s to humans who knows.
He says that like it’s a bad thing.
Then again it could be a scare campaign without a basis and the problem could actually be pollution and lack of oxygen in the water:
link
The filtration system can get rid of them as they are an order of magnitude larger than the size of water molecules as per here.
I think the question is what if the system ‘failed’. The answer that is given from the above site is that the system is designed to fail safe. If one of the steps breaks, everything stops.
I think that even if trace amounts of these organic molecules were to get through, the so called “advanced oxidation” process would decompose them into undetectable amounts.
After all this, if you believe strongly in homeopathy, then perhaps it is still all bad.
Just imagine the disastrous effect of all those man-boobs on the men’s interest niche of the magazine publishing industry.
Instead of subscribing to “Ralph”, all a punter need do is stand in front of a mirror and pull up his Mooks T-shirt.
Austin: Cool, that’s kinda what I was asking.
Don’t know what the last sentence of your comment was about though.
??
Homeopathy suggests that even very small amounts of an active biological agent can have big effects – that’s the principle it’s based on.
Ok. Check.
The real principle homeopathy is based on is the realisation that there is alot of money to be made off peoples gullibility.
That too.
It’d be interesting to see what beer brewed with recycled water would be like. Is the Castlemaine brewery likely to run out of non-recycled supply?
I call for large-scale research programmes with mass voluntary human testing.
It’d be interesting to see what beer brewed with recycled water would be like.
XXXX?
What’s wrong with these people? Wasn’t there a time when a big gut and man-boobs used to be a sign of power and virility?
Homeopathy is bunk. I was treated by one years ago on the recommendation of an otherwise very sound GP, until the homeopathist started to talk about how he made the stuff. “Well, we start with this vial of pure distilled water, and we put it in this magnetic machine and put in this card which causes the machine to change the structure…”. Oh really? Needless to say, that was my last appointment.
There could be something in the hormones in the water thing though, there’s been some concern about it in the UK and possibly elsewhere, particularly in relation to the feminisation of fish. Man-boobs might be stretching it a bit, though.
UK Environment agency
FOE paper
Beer with recycled water? We’d really be getting on the piss then. I’ve tried home brew made on creek water off a sheep property, it was excellent! Baaaa!
Drink only Czech or Belgian beer! Avoid those man boobs.
Hang on – doesn’t drinking lots of beer lead to man boobs anyway?
Personally I don’t object if people of any gender want to have boobs.
Lies, all lies.
Beer itself isn’t particularly fattening, it’s the side-dishes of chips and such you eat, and the exercise you don’t do that stack the kilos on. Avoiding man-boobs starts with getting off your arse.
Justanothermug, I’m glad to hear the homebrew was good. Was it (wait for it) l-a-a-a-ager?
It’s certainly true that synthetic hormones from excreted birth control medication are implicated in changing sex organs among some populations of reptiles and amphibians. The external genitalia of male alligators in Florida have apparantly become smaller in recent years, and in some cases closely resemble female genitalia. I’m not sure if this affects their ability to reproduce. From memory, there have been reports of similar changes in some frogs, and there has also been some speculation that hormones in drinking water might be responsible for reduced sperm counts in humans.
Springborg might have his wires crossed regarding fish. In many species of fish, individuals change from male to female as they grow, which of course has implications for fisheries management. This is entirely normal, and unrelated to environmental contamination. Dr Joan (formerly John) Roughgarden is one of the most eminent researchers of this phenomenon
Adelaide draws much of its waterfrom the Murray at a point downstream of every other major town along the river. If the man-boobs hypothesis had any legs, one would expect that all of Adelaide’s citizens would be well-endowed.
Feral Abacus, thanks for the info, and may I just say, that’s a might fine net-handle you’ve got there.
I wonder how much of the observed changes in genitalia are due to pollution with heavy metal salts and other chemicals rather than hormonal influences. I also wonder how many of the alleged changes are empirically verified.
It’s not just hormones that allegedly do the damage, detergents, and their decomposition products can mimic oestrogens and have similar effects, and are present in the water supply in considerably greater quantities than synthetic hormones. I’m not aware if the effects have been empirically verified, but there was an article in New Scientist reporting a study which claimed the problem is real, and significant for men.
Devil Drink, it was indeeeeeed a lager, and the addition of ovine excretory products and whatever other nasties might have been in the stream certainly did it no harm. Of course, before water treatment, turning it into beer was a way of making the water safer. You’re absolutely right, it’s not the beer that causes the man-boobs, its all the stuff we eat with it. Trouble is, things go better with a frosty XXXX, or a decent bottle of red.
tigtog, I know there has been some very recent work, but I can’t locate it right now.
This is a few years old, but experimentally indicates the potential for environmental hormone analogues to affect reproduction in female alligators. Another study implicates herbicides and tamoxifen (the breast cancer treatment that is used for tumours having oestrogen receptors on their cell surfaces).
I assume Springborg didn’t do much research on the issue. This review covers adverse effects of herbicides and pesticides, while this pdf shows that agricultural pesticides can make girls of boy turtles.
(I had a hell of a time getting the links to work in preview – is there a problem with long web addresses?)
Second link didn’t work. Try this web address:
http://icb.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/40/3/438
So I’m guessing the precautionary principle that has everyone a tizzy with regards to GM foods and global warming only applies when it suits.
Thanks for the links, Feral.
I find that if I want to check a link in preview I have to hit the spacebar for one space after the end of the text in the paragraph which includes the URL. Then the link shows up in preview, in Firefox at least, and you can check whether it points where you mean it to.
Hi tigtog – I’m using Firefox too. I tried adding spaces, but it seemed that wouldn’t work when the number of characters in the link exceeds the line length of the comments editor window.
Yobbo – not exactly. I must admit I don’t have a detailed understanding on this, but my recollection is that reverse osmosis filtration doesn’t have any difficulty excluding organic molecules of the size of the compounds discussed above. So in this instance it seems that recycled water should not be contaminated with hormone analogues, whereas it is likely that tap water has some level of these compounds.
I agree 100% FA. I have no doubt that this water is perfectly safe. Nevertheless, it doesn’t stop the same people who are supporting this technology here from saying “better not do it just in case” when it comes to GM foods and produce (which are also perfectly safe).
Just sayin’.
Hi Yobbo: I don’t want to divert this thread into a debate on GM, other than to say that I think the issues are much more complex. I’m not uncomfortable about GM cotton, for instance, but GM canola scares the bejesus out of me. That’s because canola belongs to a plant family (Brassicaceae) where promiscuous breeding systems are the norm. It’s only a matter of time before there will be gene flow from GM canola crops to weedy brassicas. In other cases there is evidence that GM cultivars can have effects on soil biology, with consequences for plant nutrition etc.
IMO decisions on adopting GM should be made on a case by case basis, and only after the full implications of adoption are well understood.
GM canola has been grown in Canada for over 10 years with no problems evident yet. How long do we have to wait? 100 years?
The full implications of GM canola are well known: More money, less herbicide. It is only kept out of Australia by the luddite green fringe
Yobbo – No, its ‘More money, more herbicide’. The GM canola I’m talking about has higher resistance to herbicides so that farmers can apply higher rates to weeds without damaging their crops. Though with rising oil prices the profit advantage must be eroded.
Don’t forget that it took several decades for problems to emerge with herbicide-resistant grasses in Australian wheat crops. So a decade in Canada doesn’t reassure me. Its like this – canola is grown in regions of Australia that have several closely related weeds, and these plants hybridise fairly readily. They are also fast growing and highly fecund. Canola pollen is being dispersed 100′s of metres beyond paddock boundaries – that’s been shown in several studies, including at least one Australian one. So its almost inevitable that the gene for herbicide resistance will be transferred to those weedy relatives.
The main uncertainty is whether the gene will be expressed in any hybrids. If it is, the result will likely be a fast-growing pest plant that can’t be chemically controlled. And one that will be hard to spot because it looks rather like canola.
The GM canola you are talking about enables farmers to use less herbicides because they can use more effective herbicides (Roundup) that would kill regular canola. Traditional Canola growers are forced to use many different kinds of herbicide and tilling methods to get rid of the weeds without killing the Canola.
GM Canola uses less total herbicide, less tilling, less fuel and brings in a higher price per acre than ordinary Canola. It’s an environmental miracle in every way you can think of, and good for farmers too.
The only downside to GM Canola is that Monsanto profits from its use, and because Monsanto is a succesful international corporation that makes money, greens and socialists are dedicated to bringing it down no matter the cost.
80% of Canola grown in Canada is GM, and I repeat that they have no problems with it, bar the pig-headed luddism of some European markets who refuse to buy it.
http://www.canola-council.org/facts_gmo.html
Yobbo – Thanks for the link. I also found this site which claims that the economic advantages of GM canola may be less clearcut than you stated. I’m not saying that their argument necessarily trumps yours, just pointing to another view.
I stand corrected re glyphosate application rates: I was thinking of other GM-herbicide systems. So ‘More money, less herbicide’ (unless the above link is correct).
But that doesn’t change my argument re the risks posed by GM canola. And its an ongoing risk that would persist as long as GM canola is grown in areas with other weedy brassicas. Should resistant hybrids arise, there will be the perpetually recurring costs of trying to manage what would likely be a serious pest plant that can’t be chemically controlled. That’s a big risk for a modest return.
The debate about homeopathy is not over yet.
http://www.abchomeopathy.com/skeptics.htm
http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn1532
Hey, if homeopathic ‘clustering’ can work, perhaps it wouldn’t be such a sin for the pub-owners to water down the workers’ beer.
I’ll have my research department on it right away. Ta silkworm.
Everyone should drink queer water.
Homeopathy is the future!
http://www.digibio.com/
TFA: While the Canadian Canola council claims a higher yield per acre, I’m not claiming that. The economic advantages come from reduced cultivation costs and less screenage.
And I think it’s a little silly to rely on a site produced by farmers that are only guessing what the effects of GM Canola would be – The Canadian Canola council has 10 years of commercial production to support its case, the NCF only has the fear campaigns of Greenpeace and the usual xenophobia to go by.