100th Anniversary of Water Chlorination

I became an environmental activist in the early 1970s just as I was completing my doctorate in ecology at the University of British Columbia. It was the height of the Cold War and the height of the Viet Nam War and we were compelled to take a very public stand against activities we thought to be catastrophic both for people and for the planet.

I joined a small committee that was meeting in the basement of the Unitarian Church. We organized a protest voyage against U.S. hydrogen bomb testing in Alaska and had tens of thousands marching in the streets. When that H-bomb was set off at Amchitka Island in November 1971, it was the last hydrogen bomb the U.S. ever detonated.

It was the birth of Greenpeace, the organization I co-founded, spending 15 years in its top committee, helping to lead environmental campaigns around the world.

But it's ironic in the extreme that, as we mark the 100th anniversary of drinking water chlorination, my old organization and other activist groups aligned with it continue to oppose this most important public health achievement.

Activist organizations like Greenpeace have access to a full century of observations on the results of water chlorination in the US, all the way back to September 26, 1908 when Jersey City, NJ became the first US city to chlorinate its public water supply.

It's true, there were those back then who vehemently opposed the use of this "poison" in public water supplies. According to one official at the time, continued chlorination to eradicate typhoid was akin to being "between the devil and the deep blue sea, for at present we don't know whether typhoid fever or the (chlorinated) drinking water is the worst."

Thankfully from the perspective of human health, chlorination of water supplies spread rapidly. Today, chlorination is the overwhelming choice for treating public water systems.

The results are clear. This widespread adoption of chlorine disinfection across the U.S. has had very important results. Waterborne diseases like typhoid, Hepatitis A and cholera that once killed thousands of Americans each year have been virtually eliminated. Typhoid fever cases fell by more than 99 percent between 1900 and 1960. Related childhood mortality fell dramatically. And average life expectancy rose from 47 years in 1900 to nearly 78 years in 2006.

Yet, many of my old environmental colleagues continue to vilify chlorination of water by raising unwarranted fears about health risks of chlorine and disinfection byproducts. In fact, it was a Greenpeace decision in 1986 to support a world-wide ban on all chlorine use that turned out to be a breaking point between my old organization and me.

My strongly held view is that chlorine is essential for our health. It is that simple. At the time I explained to my fellow Greenpeace International directors that water chlorination was the biggest advance in the history of public health, and in addition that the majority of our pharmaceuticals are based on chlorine chemistry. As the only board member with an education in science, my words fell on deaf ears.

In short, my former colleagues ignored science and supported the ban, giving me no choice but to leave the group as I could not support such a policy. Despite science concluding no known health risks - and ample benefits - from water chlorination, Greenpeace and other environmental groups have continued to oppose its use for more than 20 years.

I believe the opposition to the use of chemicals such as chlorine is part of a broader hostility to the use of chemicals in general. I often cite Rachel Carson's 1962 book, Silent Spring, as having had a significant impact on many pioneers of the green movement. The book raised some legitimate concerns, many rooted in science, about the risks and negative environmental impact associated with the indiscriminate use of chemicals.

But the day-to-day water chlorination that occurs across America is not in the category of indiscriminate use. For Greenpeace and groups like it, the healthy skepticism learned from Carson has hardened over the years, and given way to a mindset that treats virtually all use of chemicals with suspicion.

After a century of use and the resulting eradication of waterborne diseases across the US and the world, those activists who continue, absurdly, to oppose water chlorination only illustrate the need for an alternative environmental policy based on science and logic - not misinformation and campaigns of fear.

After all, campaigns based on groundless fears distract the public from real environmental threats such as air pollution and tropical deforestation for example.

As we mark one of the key milestones in improving the public health of Americans right across the country, let's always remember we all have a responsibility to be environmental stewards. But stewardship requires that science drive our public policy, just as it did a hundred years ago in Jersey City.

An advisor to government and industry Dr. Patrick Moore is a co-founder and former leader of Greenpeace, and is now chair and Chief Scientist at Greenspirit Strategies Ltd. www.greenspiritstrategies.com

Comments

[dapperd72]

With all due respect to your scientific background, I seriously question the accuracy of your claims that no evidence of chlorine's hazards to human or other environmental health exists. Chlorine is known by the EPA as a carcinogen and is also the key reason why I can't stand to swim in public swimming pools most of the time. My eyes burn like they're on fire and the water makes me severely congested so I sneeze relentlessly. If chlorine is so conducive to human health, wouldn't pool water be just as "safe" to drink as tap water? I personally never drink tap water without first purifying it through my distiller with a carbon-block filter. This removes 99.9999% of all toxins, including arsenic, chlorine, fluoride and many other trace substances that the federal government may classify as "GRAS" or "Generally Recognized as Safe" despite the cumulative toxicity and carcinogenicity of these compounds. Unfortunately, many of these conclusions were partly derived from animal experiments which are inherently ethically and scientifically questionable (at best) but epidemiological and clinical studies have amply demonstrated their danger to human health anyhow. I remain extremely skeptical of any scientist who proclaims their alleged safety as if they should be a part of a "balanced diet." Greenpeace was & is exactly right to oppose them and I'm sorry you broke ranks with them over this crucial issue.

[Swerinjer]

Looky what I found on google:

1) "prenatal exposure to disinfection by-products [from chlorinated drinking water] increases the risk of ventricular septal defects, cleft palate, and anencephalus. The evidence on ventricular septal defects is consistent in the three available studies" http://www.ehjournal.net/content/7/1/23

2) "exposure to chlorination by-products in drinking water is associated with increased risk of colon cancer." http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=1380892

3) "The results of this meta-analysis suggest a positive association between consumption of chlorination by-products in drinking water and bladder and rectal cancer in humans." http://www.ajph.org/cgi/content/abstract/82/7/955

[JScott]

Oh please all this other whining about how it's bad-jeez people have been drinking chlorinated water for years and there hasn't been a whopping increase in conditions supposedly associated with chlorination and for that matter floridation. They should quit whining and go on to the larger problem of freshwater availibility and land use planning for those areas seeking more water so that the affected areas are stricken with massive urban sprawl as a result.
And despite this there are still places where the water tho safe to drink tastes terrible-
Renton Wa., Highland NY, Austin Tx, San Antonio Tx.

[Swerinjer]

Duplicate the scientific experiments I posted and show they lead to different results or shut up.

[Thermodynamics]

Ever had amoebic dysentery?
Bad water will make you really sick and then you have to take a course of treatment using strong drugs such as Flagil.

On the other hand, anyone who has ever had an aquarium knows that chlorinated water will kill your fish promptly.

The simple solution:
An inexpensive activated carbon pitcher filter (Brita, etc) will remove chlorine and chlorination by-products such a trihalomethanes.

[KillTheMessenger]

I believe there is a slight difference between fish and man... fish breathe in water, we merely drink it... which should suffice to explain why chlorinated water is bad for fish but essentially harmless to man.

Most people tend to forget that in the past people did not drink pure water if they could avoid it. There were very good reasons (at least for Europeans) to drink large quantities of beer and wine: at least the rich could afford limit their exposure to water borne disease by ingesting less dangerous (and better tasting) "spirits". Similarly people liked their foods well cooked (as in simmered for hours or days in a stew) because parasites had to be avoided at all cost.

[Swerinjer]

"essentially harmless to man." Please refer to my post of three scientific studies showing chlorinated water increases the risk for cancer, especially rectal cancer. Remember Mr. Brady? You don't want to go out like that.

[Swerinjer]

"Despite science concluding no known health risks - and ample benefits - from water chlorination, Greenpeace and other environmental groups have continued to oppose its use."

Bull. Science shows water chlorination increases the risk for cancer. Here's the conclusions of three different scientific studies, with attribution:

1) "prenatal exposure to disinfection by-products [from chlorinated drinking water] increases the risk of ventricular septal defects, cleft palate, and anencephalus. The evidence on ventricular septal defects is consistent in the three available studies" http://www.ehjournal.net/content/7/1/23

2) "exposure to chlorination by-products in drinking water is associated with increased risk of colon cancer." http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=1380892

3) "The results of this meta-analysis suggest a positive association between consumption of chlorination by-products in drinking water and bladder and rectal cancer in humans." http://www.ajph.org/cgi/content/abstract/82/7/955

[NormanHoarsecough]

Hey Swerinjer, I checked the links you provide here, and they really don't prove that disinfection byproducts cause cancer or have any adverse effects on humans. EPA limits DBP levels in drinking water to minimize potential risks, but the priority for them is to maintain citizen protection protecting from disease-causing microorganisms. The link below has some interesting background on the EPA's efforts in this area.

http://www.epa.gov/safewater/disinfection/stage2/basicinformation.html#e
leven

[Swerinjer]

Then you don't agree with the science. Let's see you duplicate the tests and show different results.

BTW I checked your link-those protection standards are VOLUNTARY! LOL. If you read the "What are the requirements of the final rule" section you'll see that instead of measuring every monitoring station in the system for DBPs and taking an average, they are allowed to choose their OWN "high-risk" areas to test seperately! Talk about a license for abuse.

And then (assuming the system operators are honest) if there is a high level of DBPs detected they are required to write a report that identitifies what they'll do to avoid any future contamination in the future. That means there's NO PENALTY OR REQUIREMENT FOR COMPLIANCE! LOL.

THERE AINT NO PROTECTION THERE. Thats a bunch of doublespeak that allows a corrupt system.

[KillTheMessenger]

Swerinjer, you are entitled not to drink chlorinated water. Nobody will force you to ingest it.

What you are entitled to is your own reality. Even using the worst case outcomes of your quoted analysis, the negative effects of chlorination count in the hundreds of people a year range, while the known health effects of stopping chlorination would be in the millions.

Life is a compromise and so is chlorination. I hope you will learn, one day, how to strike a healthy compromise in matters of life an health.

[Swerinjer]

I'm just posting some scientific research. you can make your own judgement...do you believe in this op-ed or the science.