Impact/Purpose:

The initial objective is to evaluate a large suite of chemical compounds for their correlation the incidence of illness due to human contamination of water sources. The ultimate objective of this task is to develop and evaluate a method that will determine the two to five strongest chemical candidates that are associated with human waste streams, and determine their ability to monitor water quality and predict human health effects in source and finished waters as a surrogate for traditional methods of human fecal contamination.

Description:

Currently, the quality of drinking and recreational waters is estimated through the measurement of fecal bacteria such as Escherichia coli and Enterococci. However, since it takes time for the microorganisms to grow and be detected, their utility as indicators of human fecal contamination and their ability to minimize contact with contaminated waters is limited (by the time you get results, people will have long been in contact with the contaminated water). One way of decreasing the analysis time is to examine chemical indicators, which do not require the many hours to detect or measure the analyte. Chemical indicators may also be useful in tracing sources of fecal contaminations in watersheds in which the total maximum daily loads (TMDLs) of fecal organisms exceed the established limits. Compounds from a variety of classes, such as those which are produced and excreted by humans (coprostanol, urobilin, bile acids), those which are ingested nearly exclusively by humans (certain pharmaceuticals, caffeine, nicotine), and those which can enter the human waste stream (surfactants, fluorescent whitening agents, musks) have all been individually suggested for use as chemical indicators of human fecal contamination, but no one has tried to unite all of the variety of compounds in a single method. A select grouping of compounds from these classes have been investigated to determine their concentration and stability in the environment, and general worthiness to serve as indicators or tracers of fecal material. Most of the published studies did not investigate if there is a relationship between the concentrations of the compounds and illnesses caused by human fecal material, or even compare the concentrations of the chemical indicators to the microbial ones, so there is no measure of the utility of the compounds to act as indicators. The purpose of this task is to investigate the relationship between the concentration of the chemical indicators and human health impacts through an epidemiological study with EPA's National Health and Environmental Effects Research Laboratory. The epidemiological study will judge the ability of these classes of chemicals to serve as indicators of human fecal material in recreational and/or drinking water source waters, which will help to protect human health.

Record Details:

Record Type:PROJECT

Start Date:10/01/2003

Projected Completion Date:09/01/2006

OMB Category:Other

Record ID: 76745

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Project Information:

Progress :This task began in FY04. A new interagency agreement (IAG) between the US Environmental Protection Agency and the US Geological Survey was written and approved. The first year of the epidemiological study was also completed. For the epidemiological study, samples were collected at two beaches, Washington Park and Silver Beach, on Lake Michigan. When the IAG was written, the sampling design consisted of three samples collected at the waist deep sampling point, once a day, for each of the two weekend sampling days during the eight weeks of the sampling period, for a total of 96 samples. To better understand the spatial distribution of the chemical indicators, it was decided to adjust the sampling scheme to collect two waist deep and two shin deep samples. Additionally, the overall time frame increased from eight weeks to ten. This increased the number of samples to 160. It is anticipated that the four sample collection scheme will be used again in FY05.

Relevance :The purpose of this task is to determine if chemical indicators, instead of the traditional microbial indicators, can be used to monitor recreational and/ or drinking water source waters for pathogens (that is, to determine if their presence is correlated to waterborne illness). The chemical indicators are desirable, since the analysis time is significantly shorter (2- 3 hours versus 24 hours), and it should be possible to determine source specificity (human versus animal). These two traits will help minimize human exposure to pathogens. The faster one can determine if a water body is tainted, the earlier steps can be taken to minimize contact/ consumption, resulting in fewer people being exposed. The quick analysis time of the chemical indicators will also allow a faster determination of when it is safe to resume contact/ consumption. Additionally, since most waterborne pathogens that cause human illness result from contact with human fecal material, the ability to discriminate between human and animal waste will prevent unnecessary measures (beach closures, boil advisories, increased chlorine use at treatment facilities) when the contamination is zoonotic, and not anthropogenic. The Office of Ground Water and Drinking Water, as well as other federal, state and local agencies, should be able to use this method to protect the public's health by screening recreational and drinking waters. Since many of the compounds being focused on in this task are pharmaceuticals, it also meets one the Office of Wastewater Management's research needs: Characterizing the Presence of Pharmaceuticals in Water and Wastewater. A third benefit is that pharmaceuticals have been listed as candidates for a future Contaminant Candidate List. This project will provide occurrence information to OGWDW for some pharmaceuticals. Throughout the course of the project, oral and poster presentations at a wide variety of conferences, as well as publications as certain phases of the task are completed, should keep the scientific and regulatory community informed of our progress.

Clients :Office of Ground Water and Drinking Water (Hiba Shukairy, Valerie Blank, Kesha Forrest)

Project IDs:

ID Code :18179

Project type :OMIS