Troubled Waters

According to researchers at the University at Buffalo, high concentrations of antidepressants and their metabolized remnants are building up in the brain tissue of 10 fish species found in the Niagara River—a vital conduit connecting Lake Erie and Lake Ontario.

No, the fish haven’t been popping pills. The drugs got there through the wastewater flushed down household drains, which—even after treatment in plants—deposits these substances into rivers and lakes.

The antidepressants detected in fish brains had accumulated over time, often reaching concentrations that were several times higher than the levels in the river itself.

 “Fish are receiving this cocktail of drugs 24 hours a day,” says Diana Aga, Henry M. Woodburn Professor of Chemistry at UB and lead author of the study. While the compounds likely do not pose a danger to people who eat the fish, they “could affect fish behavior,” says Aga, citing other studies showing that antidepressants can impact fishes’ feeding habits and survival instincts, posing a threat to biodiversity.

Aga has spent her career developing techniques for detecting pharmaceuticals and other contaminants in the environment. This is a field of growing concern as the use of such chemicals has significantly increased.

Making matters worse, wastewater treatment has not kept up, says Aga. Treatment facilities focus on removing solid waste and killing bacteria—not on extracting chemicals. And sewage overflows, which funnel large quantities of untreated water directly into waterways, exacerbate the problem.

The worrisome finding has led to important new avenues of inquiry for Aga’s lab: What exactly are the effects on the fish? Are there antidepressants and other chemicals in birds and eggs, too? And, perhaps most pressing—how can antidepressants and other impurities in wastewater be removed?