Traces Of Prozac Found In London's Water Supply

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So why aren't we all any happier?

No, really. Did anyone else read this in this morning's Metro?

― Super-Masonic Black Hole (kate), Monday, 9 August 2004 11:42 (twenty-one years ago)

Why am I not surprised? It's not a question of "why aren't [Londoners] happier?" but rather "so this is why we're not all mass murderers!" innit?

― Sick Mouthy (Nick Southall), Monday, 9 August 2004 11:46 (twenty-one years ago)

Entering the water table through treated sewage apparently. Mmm. Nice.

― Matt DC (Matt DC), Monday, 9 August 2004 11:46 (twenty-one years ago)

I was listening to a story a while back on the radio about the huge amounts of pharmaceuticals that are found in the ocean and in other waterways and how it is starting to effect the fish in a big way. They have found traces of just about everything you can think of, medicine-wise.

― scott seward (scott seward), Monday, 9 August 2004 11:46 (twenty-one years ago)

Also happy Londoners = third term for Tony!

― Matt DC (Matt DC), Monday, 9 August 2004 11:46 (twenty-one years ago)

Yeah, it does make you wonder what else is ending up in the water supply.

And also, how many people's dosages of Prozac are way off if they are excreting that amount in their urine!

― Super-Masonic Black Hole (kate), Monday, 9 August 2004 11:47 (twenty-one years ago)

how 'big' is Prozac? would it slip through a Brita?

― the neurotic awakening of s (blueski), Monday, 9 August 2004 11:49 (twenty-one years ago)

How big of molecules does a Brita filter for? I mean, it doesn't filtre out limescale, does it? So could it filter Prozac?

― Super-Masonic Black Hole (kate), Monday, 9 August 2004 11:58 (twenty-one years ago)

what's the problem here?

― dog latin (dog latin), Monday, 9 August 2004 11:58 (twenty-one years ago)

This explains the big brother threads.

― Leon Czolgosz (Nicole), Monday, 9 August 2004 11:59 (twenty-one years ago)

How much Prozac would a Brita filter filter if a Brita filter could filter Prozac, is what yr asking, aye?

― Sick Mouthy (Nick Southall), Monday, 9 August 2004 11:59 (twenty-one years ago)

Oestrogen is in our water too, apparently, from contraceptive-pill-spiked pee, and is reducing London's collective sperm count.

― beanz (beanz), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:00 (twenty-one years ago)

and possibly contributing to a man-boob epidemic.

― beanz (beanz), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:01 (twenty-one years ago)

and changing the sex of fish.

― MarkH (MarkH), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:01 (twenty-one years ago)

Gah, I HATE the metro misery paper, any boneheaded scaremongering bullshit gets front page news. As if it isn't bad enough having to deal with London's transport system without reading about how fresh air gives you cancer or some other shite.

― mzui, Monday, 9 August 2004 12:02 (twenty-one years ago)

Ah, but I love the Metro for those exact reasons... I was so happy to find a spare copy on the 133 this morning!

― Super-Masonic Black Hole (kate), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:03 (twenty-one years ago)

if you want scare-mongering try the Daily Mail propah

― the neurotic awakening of s (blueski), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:04 (twenty-one years ago)

I'm convinced it's written & edited by a team of Irish Grandmothers.

― mzui, Monday, 9 August 2004 12:05 (twenty-one years ago)

Like what if a baby croc got down there and there was a radiation like in the movies?

― Gribowitz (Lynskey), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:05 (twenty-one years ago)

But the Metro is more white-collar oriented. So it's, like, Office Hazard Scares, rather than "oh no, assylum seekers, oh no!" scares.

― Super-Masonic Black Hole (kate), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:06 (twenty-one years ago)

Metro, taken seriously, just eradicates all reason for living and going out in London, so I try to avoid it.

― mzui, Monday, 9 August 2004 12:08 (twenty-one years ago)

Yes, but the trick is to *not* take it seriously. Just think "ho ho, this is all Metro scare-mongering, it's all rubbish!" and there goes all your paranoia and fear, and you're happy to go out again.

― Super-Masonic Black Hole (kate), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:08 (twenty-one years ago)

Yeah, they know their audience. Londoners are switched off by the anti-immigration stuff. You can't be a xenophobe and live in London, you'd be constantly furious every time you walk down the street. But 99 commuters in every 100 are pissed off that they're going to work. We like to have our prejudices and dislikes confirmed by our newspapers.

xpost

― beanz (beanz), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:10 (twenty-one years ago)

Too late, I've already painted the living-room floorboards alternate candy stripes and theres a naked chiese woman hanging around my earls court flat.

― mzui, Monday, 9 August 2004 12:11 (twenty-one years ago)

At least y'allses fish will be happy.

― latebloomer (latebloomer), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:14 (twenty-one years ago)

Beanz OTM, you can't be a xenophobia wouldn't work. But there are subtler more narrow-focus ways of hating people in London for no good reason, like eejits who stand on the right-hand side of the escalators etc:

― mzui, Monday, 9 August 2004 12:14 (twenty-one years ago)

Jeex, I'm incoherent, and it's only my second campari and soda of the day. Apologies..

― mzui, Monday, 9 August 2004 12:16 (twenty-one years ago)

Gah, I HATE the metro misery paper

isn't this story the exact opposite of misery?

― ken c (ken c), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:18 (twenty-one years ago)

I mean, yeah, seriously, relax, dude. Chill out. It's not so bad, is it, London? Or the Metro. I feel rather pleasant, in fact. ;-)

― Super-Masonic Black Hole (kate), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:19 (twenty-one years ago)

also, people who want to filter out prozac from their water hate fun, obv.

― ken c (ken c), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:20 (twenty-one years ago)

eejits who stand on the right-hand side of the escalators etc

and people who amble slowly on busy streets. If you can't physically walk quickly, fine, but just strolling diagonally in someone else's way is infuriating. Rural types get upset about the "pace" of London - everyone moves too fast etc - but it's just good manners to keep moving. Therefore Londoners are politer than hicks.

Um, anyway, back to the topic: Maybe the happiness from the prozac is counterbalanced by the gloomy outlook of the Metro.

― beanz (beanz), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:22 (twenty-one years ago)

Oops mzui, we both mean stand on the left innit.

― beanz (beanz), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:23 (twenty-one years ago)

phew! i thought i was going mad.. i was all worried that even standing on the right is now wrong!!

― ken c (ken c), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:26 (twenty-one years ago)

I was wondering there for a bit! Although I attributed it to whatever tradition makes the U.K. drive on the left side of the road versus Americans on the right.

― j.lu (j.lu), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:29 (twenty-one years ago)

Gah, I HATE the metro misery paper

i think someone should get mzui a big glass of water...

(i saw an article about this in the observer, with the slant that it is evidence that doctors are over-prescribing prozac, not as much scaremongering about not drinking the water. i'd be interested to hear from some of the sciencey types out there how high the concentration of this or any other drug would have to be to have serious health implications)

― colette (a2lette), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:30 (twenty-one years ago)

whenever I go on the Undreground I always think that an evil scheming employee could cause havoc by putting up a KEEP LEFT sign at one end of a pedestrian tunnel in a station and a KEEP RIGHT sign at the other end.

― MarkH (MarkH), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:30 (twenty-one years ago)

Yea! And another thing the water stin.......

Actually I get the overground to work nowadays and it's so much nicer, they have seats you know!

― mzui, Monday, 9 August 2004 12:34 (twenty-one years ago)

j.lu: UK drives on left because we never had Napoleon insisting we pass on the right to make it more difficult to draw swords and fight for the right of way. (If you're right-handed it's tough to fight that way because your horse's head gets in the way). And we codified it as passing on the left to ensure it didn't look like we were copying Napoleon.
(This is one of a few oft-quoted explanations)
xpost

a KEEP LEFT sign at one end of a pedestrian tunnel in a station and a KEEP RIGHT sign at the other end

It wouldn't surprise me at all if they already do.

― beanz (beanz), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:34 (twenty-one years ago)

driving on the right came from the way knights used to hold their sword and shield AFAIR... i'll google about it.

― ken c (ken c), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:36 (twenty-one years ago)

Maybe we need to kick off a 'best things about London' thread.

― mzui, Monday, 9 August 2004 12:37 (twenty-one years ago)

excerpts from here http://www.audifans.com/archives/1997/10/msg00322.html
In England driving on the left side of the road came from rules for the
>sport of jousting. When jousting the knights would come at each other in
>such a way that allowed them to hold the joust?? in their right hand. This
>was reinforced by the fact that when jousting in this fashion the joust??
>would not hit the left side (heart side) of the opposing knight thus avoiding
>fatal injuries. Thus people began to get use to staying to the left side of
>the road.
The lance was held in the right hand and aimed at the shield of the opposing
knight (unless they were trying to kill each other) while using their own
shield to protect themselves. To do this, the knights had to pass left side to
left side, like driving on the right. Later lance equipped brigades of the
British army such as the Light Brigade would pass to the left, because as they
passed their target they could allow the lance to rotate downwards or to the
right so that the direction of the charge would help to release the lance from
its target.

― ken c (ken c), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:46 (twenty-one years ago)

also... http://www.tulipacademy.org/cam/chiv.htm

d. Driving on the right or left side of the road.
In ancient Britain when the first roads were being laid out, traffic would tend to the left so that the man's sword arm would be closest to the approaching traffic. In colonial America, since the musket or rifle would be cradled in the left arm, traffic tended to the right so that the business end would be pointed appropriately.

― ken c (ken c), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:47 (twenty-one years ago)

it's the same for the way spiral staircases twist in castles

― Porkpie (porkpie), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:50 (twenty-one years ago)

That's absurd. Europeans had swords and jousting too and most of them drive on the right shurely!

― Archel (Archel), Monday, 9 August 2004 12:52 (twenty-one years ago)

Maybe that's where Napoleon came in.

― beanz (beanz), Monday, 9 August 2004 13:00 (twenty-one years ago)

OK what I want to know is how come water here isn't full of this shit. It's definitely not full of estrogen from birth control pills, though I guess I cannot say it is not full of Prozac. I guess my point here is that either the water filtration places in the UK are totally horrible or that our drugs are completely different that we aren't pissing out this much drugs.

Does anyone have a scientific explanation for it or is it really so simple as a different filtration process?

― Allyzay Science Explosion (allyzay), Monday, 9 August 2004 14:01 (twenty-one years ago)

how come water here isn't full of this shit

I suspect they describe it in the annual reports under a different name.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Monday, 9 August 2004 14:01 (twenty-one years ago)

Well...

1) we're still using a Victorian filtration system and a Victorian sewage system (lovely old Bazalgette)

2) I think the English will call shit shit, while Americans will try to dress it up as calling it "acceptible levels of fertile matter" or some such euphemism. But it's still in yer water.

― Super-Masonic Black Hole (kate), Monday, 9 August 2004 14:03 (twenty-one years ago)

NYC Water Not Kosher

― Red Panda Sanskrit (ex machina), Monday, 9 August 2004 14:07 (twenty-one years ago)

Gah, I HATE the metro misery paper, any boneheaded scaremongering bullshit gets front page news.

But it isn't really bullshit is it? There *is* prozac in the water... which might not be so great. Me and my 'hick' naivety, huh?

― ENRQ (Enrique), Monday, 9 August 2004 14:08 (twenty-one years ago)

People,people! Can we THINK of the fishies!?!

― Red Panda Sanskrit (ex machina), Monday, 9 August 2004 14:10 (twenty-one years ago)

Actually it really isn't. There are actual side effects to having trace amounts of certain things in your water; whatever amount of left-over birth control pills, for example, that we have in our water is far less than the amounts seen in the UK. Like I said I dunno about this prozac mystery though. My thoughts on the matter are that you guys probably are getting more than "traces" of these products, otherwise no one would see a need to make the report public. I think that #1 is a bad thing, they really need to upgrade those, I mean just for simple fact that the water tastes awful there.

Our water is inexplicably full of flouride, on purpose, though. Do they do that in Britain?

xpost Jon couldn't you have found a way to link to the article about the copeheads and not the entire thread?

― Allyzay Science Explosion (allyzay), Monday, 9 August 2004 14:10 (twenty-one years ago)

Ally! I linked to the post's ANCHOR sorry

― Red Panda Sanskrit (ex machina), Monday, 9 August 2004 14:11 (twenty-one years ago)

My thoughts on the matter are that you guys probably are getting more than "traces" of these products, otherwise no one would see a need to make the report public.

Tracer drinks traces in London.

― Leon Czolgosz (Nicole), Monday, 9 August 2004 14:16 (twenty-one years ago)

Our water is inexplicably full of flouride, on purpose, though.

Inexplicably on purpose? ;-)

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Monday, 9 August 2004 14:18 (twenty-one years ago)

i tend to avoid drinking unfiltered tap water in London anyway. not that i know what's in Evian i guess.

― the neurotic awakening of s (blueski), Monday, 9 August 2004 14:21 (twenty-one years ago)

French female hormones are hott...

― ENRQ (Enrique), Monday, 9 August 2004 14:37 (twenty-one years ago)

There is some public health agenda to put flouride in the water (good for the kiddies teeth or something), I don't think Thames water do this at present.

― jel -- (jel), Monday, 9 August 2004 15:09 (twenty-one years ago)

http://befreetech.com/fluoridation.htm

― Red Panda Sanskrit (ex machina), Monday, 9 August 2004 15:10 (twenty-one years ago)

But it isn't really bullshit is it? There *is* prozac in the water... which might not be so great. Me and my 'hick' naivety, huh?

Actually, this really is very disturbing. Not least because Prozac is far from the most prescribed anti-depressant in the U.K. (last time I checked, that 'honour' went to Seroxat - Paxil if you're in the U.S. - which Glaxo Wellcome spent a lot of money marketing as 'non-addictive' and which turned out to be highly addictive). I don't know whether this has picked up on Prozac because it is the most famous drug of its type or because it really is there in greater quantity than the rest of the drugs. Either way, its bad news. Anyone who reckons taking this type of drug is 'fun' obviously hasn't experienced some of the side-effects.

I don't want that crap in my system, thanks - and I'm not sure it was just London's supply. When I watched this on Euronews last night, it seemed like it was the UK water supply in general. The bottled water manufacturers must be rubbing their hands in delight..

― hobart paving (hobart paving), Monday, 9 August 2004 15:19 (twenty-one years ago)

Too bad bottled water isn't as pure as tap water.

― Spencer Chow (spencermfi), Monday, 9 August 2004 16:57 (twenty-one years ago)

Too bad bottled water isn't as pure as tap water.

On what do you base this comment?

― hobart paving (hobart paving), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 10:11 (twenty-one years ago)

http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/39905000/jpg/_39905985_dasani_203.jpg

― ken c (ken c), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 10:25 (twenty-one years ago)

Ken, you japester. That's tap water in a bottle, innit.

― hobart paving (hobart paving), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 10:27 (twenty-one years ago)

I guess it's been washed away now.

― the pinefox, Tuesday, 10 August 2004 11:53 (twenty-one years ago)

what you want is cryptosporidium...

― Robbie Lumsden (Wallace Stevens HQ), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 12:08 (twenty-one years ago)

Is it possible that the US has less crap in its water because they use vastly more water per person? So it's that much more dilute in the sewage. Just a thought.

― Markelby (Mark C), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 12:33 (twenty-one years ago)

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