Agenda - 06-04-1981 - Laserfiche WebLink

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V WATER QUALITY The earliest recognized water quality problems had to do with the con- tamination of water supplies with human and animal wastes. Pathogens including those responsible for typhoid fever and cholera live in the human and animal digestive tracts and can be transmitted by drinking water that has been in contact with body waste products. Typhoid fever and cholera were major causes of death until the beginning of this century when the chlorination process for disinfecting water was developed. Chlorination of public drinking water supplies rather quickly eliminated the spread of water-borne diseases in the United States. Water quality no longer was a major concern. In recent years, concern over water quality has reemerged centered around new classes of pollutants like heavy metals, synthetic organic compounds and low-level radioactivity. Our modern technological so- ciety uses,at a scale unequaled in the past, a, great number of these materiels. They are indespensible for the functioning of our modern society. However, many of them have the potential to affect human health. The misuse and unproper disposal of these materials has caused many of them to become pollutants in surface and ground water supplies. Some of the pollutants are materials like lead which have long been used by man,but are now being used on a large scale, beyond the ab- - ility of the environment to absorb them and render them harmless. The total number of automobiles registered in this country has increased from 33 million in 1950 to 111 million by 1976. The growth in the automobile population has even outpaced the significant growth in the people population during this time. The United States now uses in commerce about 1.3 billion tons of lead each year, mostly as an additive to gasoline and in automotive batteries, brake linings and tires. It has been known for some time that lead ingestion in relatively large amounts can produce overt symptoms of illness. Interference with men- tal functions has been documented for children eating chips of lead- based paint. More recently, a study published in the New England Jour- nal of Medicine reported that lead contamination too mild to produce overt symptoms of illness may nevertheless do enough damage to a child's brain to interfere with mental function and classroom performance. This conclusion was reached based on a study of 2000 school children. Although lead-based paint was ruled out as the source, no other sin- gle source of lead could be identified. Lead is widely dispersed by automobile exhaust and the frictional wear of brake linings and tires. studies have discovered significant lead concentrations in the air, soil and water in areas where automobile use is concentrated. Synthetic organic compounds are another class of potential water poll- utants. Many of these chemicals have been "created" only rather re- cently in chemical research laboratories to meet the needs of our tech- nological society. They include plastics, fertilizers, detergents, and a host of chemicals used, in modern industrial processes. The num- ber and amounts of these materials used in our society began to pro- 24