LOL "pest control" isn't that inaccurate...

Roughly one-third of the male fish in British rivers are developing female characteristics, in a frightening trend that could severely upset the ecological balance of the waterways. What's more, the trend could affect humans, with a devastating effect on fertility. The problem is apparently caused by certain chemicals used in pest-control treatment, which cannot be removed by existing methods of sewage treatment. Environmentalists are urgently calling for a ban on those pesticides.

Oh, wait. That's not right.

The first part of the story is true. Male fish are developing female traits, and the implications -- for fish and for humans -- are indeed frightening.

And the problem is caused by chemicals that sewage-treatment plants cannot remove. But those chemicals aren't used by farmers as pesticides. The culprits are estrogens, used by millions of women in birth-control pills.

Needless to say, environmentalists are not calling for a ban on the use of the Pill. Everyone knows that we gotta have our Pills, regardless of the cost.

-from Diogenes/CWN

Comments

Anonymous said…
And given the fact that there are benefits to said pills other than avoiding pregnancy, you can be assured they won't be going away.

Which of course leads to the more reasonable argument and conclusion, how do we go about getting this crap out of the water?

To avoid argument about the pill (cause I don't want to :p ), is there actually any known safe thing they can do to the water to get it out?
9:39 AM
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