I heard a topic being discussed on a health show about the rates of breast cancer and what could be some causative factors, and the subject of what's in our water came up. Traces of all kinds of medications are found in the water supply of the US.
A pharmacist wrote an article for the paper saying the best way to dispose of medications is not to flush them down the toilet, but to crush or dissolve meds, mix it up with kitty litter and put it in the trash. Some pharmacies also have a take back program when somebody dies and leaves a bag full of meds.
Doctors here who make trips to Central America used to take these meds to Honduras and the other Central American countries to distribute to the indigent people there, but the US government came up with some regulation where they can't do that anymore. It must have been OUR government--because I can't imagine the natives down there (speaking in a Spanish accent) saying "Keep yer stinkin' used pills, we don wan them!"

Anyway, I phoned the head of the wastewater treatment facility in Hattiesburg to ask who is overseeing what is being discharged into the sewage facilities. This was a new head of the facility and she was unaware, which I find hard to believe, about the stink from the yeast plant. There is a plant that manufactures yeast, and the waste water is discharged into a lagoon on the south side of town.
Every few months the entire south side of town reeks with foul odor coming from a lagoon, and it's been tracked back to this yeast plant. It's headline news every time.

I asked this lady what about the chicken processing plant on that side of town--is their effluent treated before being pumped into the lagoon?
And what about funeral homes? Is human blood pumped out of cadavers during embalming treated before being flushed down the drain? I mean potentially there's hepatitis A, B, and C,
HIV viruses, HPV viruses, all kinds of viruses just flushed down the drain. She said the lagoon is treated for bacteria, not viruses, but is aware of the dangers to employes, she knows there are danger there, and they must wear gloves when working around the lagoon.

But mostly, there's very little treatment of sewage water, and very very little oversight and regulation because she said it would cost too much to hire enough employees to monitor it. So what happens is the lagoon is pumped into the river, most of it as contaminated as when it went in.
Do you think I'd eat a fish from the river? Dip a toe in that river? No way, not me, not susil.

I bought cases of drinking water from Walmart and noticed it came from the Dallas municipal water supply--not pumped from a natural spring which makes it seem safer. Dallas water supply? I've been there. I drank that water--is was bad. But some company "purified" it and bottled it and there I am, buying it.
Well, it's probably as safe and clean as any other water source--meaning it's all nasty stuff.

susil