Ban the Pill - Save the Fish!

Intersex fish found in Pennsylvania rivers spur search for chemicals

Pennsylvania's Department of Environmental Protection has begun an extensive sampling of chemical contaminants in response to the discovery of intersex fish in three of the state's rivers, a department spokeswoman said. Male fish carrying eggs were found in the Susquehanna, Delaware and Ohio river basins, a sign that the water may be tainted with chemicals, the U.S. Geological Survey found in research released Monday.

Amanda Witman, a DEP spokeswoman, said the agency is testing two tributaries of the Susquehanna River: Juniata River and Swatara Creek.

The number of fish affected and the severity was surprising.- Vicki Blazer, a fish biologist and lead author of the USGS study. The USGS research said that two fish species, smallmouth bass and white sucker, were exhibiting intersex characteristics due to exposure to endocrine-disrupting chemicals — hormones and hormone-mimicking chemicals that caused the male fish to produce eggs.

 Hormones; is there anything they can't do?

"The sources of estrogenic chemicals are most likely complex mixtures from both agricultural sources, such as animal wastes, pesticides and herbicides, and human sources from wastewater treatment plant effluent and other sewage discharges," said Vicki Blazer, a fish biologist and lead author of the USGS study.

Estrogenic chemicals disrupt the endocrine system, which regulates the release of hormones such as estrogen and testosterone. This interferes with the fish's ability to reproduce.
. . .
In the Pennsylvania survey, Blazer and colleagues collected fish from 16 sites in the Susquehanna, Delaware and Ohio river basins. Intersex males were found at every site where smallmouth bass were collected and their condition was generally worse in places just downstream from wastewater treatment plants, the researchers found.

Hmm, just downstream of sewage treatment plants, where I wonder could hormones come from in sewage treatment plant?

Bass seem especially prone to becoming intersex when exposed to estrogenic compounds, the study found. The researchers also sampled white suckers and redhorse suckers. Redhorse suckers didn't have any intersex characteristics, but the team found an egg cell precursor, or stem cells that could potentially develop into eggs, in the blood of some white suckers.

Note the lack of emphasis of on what is the probable source of a significant amount of the estrogenic compounds in the water, birth control pills consumed by women, which are excreted in their urine, and pass, essentially unaffected.  You can't even write that in a newspaper for fear of being tagged with the "war on women" meme.

Mind you, I'm not really advocating banning the pill in the Chesapeake drainage (although, clearly the EPA could do so, if they really wanted to, based on their claimed mandate).  But if there were even the slightest hint that this problem were due to the disposal of fracking water, you could be sure that newspapers and environmental NGOs would be calling for the immediate end of fracking.

Oh wait, they already are.

And if more women were sports fisherman, there might also be increased interest in really finding a solution to the problem. So take your wives, girl friends and daughter fishing; it's good for the fishes.  But take your wives and girlfriends on different trips.

Wombat-socho has the father of all Rule 5 posts "Rule 5 Sunday: On The Beach" up at The Other McCain.