The mussels may die happy but it is still pollution.
An excerpt.
Prozac pollutes Ohio waterways, menaces mussels
By Mike Lafferty
The Columbus Dispatch
Tuesday, September 12, 2006
The widely prescribed antidepressant Prozac is ending up in streams and rivers, endangering freshwater mussels, scientists said yesterday.
Many species of mussels, including those in Ohio, are endangered or in decline, already hammered by agricultural and industrial pollution.
Researchers have known since the 1960s that birth-control pills and other drugs and chemicals that affect hormone systems can turn male fish into females.
There are no regulations that require that drugs be screened from sewage dumped into rivers and streams. The human body absorbs most drugs and flushes the rest.
A new study by scientists at the federal government's Hollings Marine Laboratory in South Carolina shows that even minute amounts of Prozac cause female freshwater mussels to release larvae early, dooming them because they cannot live on their own. The research, discussed yesterday at the annual American Chemical Society meeting in San Francisco, has disturbing implications for an ambitious program to restore endangered mussels to many Ohio streams, including the Big Darby Creek and the Scioto River.
"People have suggested the drug connection. The same thing has been suggested for fish. There's no reason why mussels should be exempted," said Tom Watters, an Ohio State University biologist who is directing the reintroduction program.
