Soaring antidepressant use is turning our waters into a ‘drug soup’ and changing marine life’s ability to mate, feed and move

• Portsmouth’s Institute of Marine Biology is calling for a range of new measures 
• This includes upgrading waste water treatment plants to filter out the chemicals
• They also suggest educating patients on the safe disposal of medications
• Drug firms are being asked to design drugs that break down safely in water

Rising use of antidepressants is turning our waters into a ‘drug soup’ and harming marine life, experts warn.

People in Britain use more antidepressants than almost every other country in the Western world.

But the drugs can cause havoc in the natural world after they pass out of the body of the person taking them in the form of urine and faeces and enter the water supply.

Effects include the chemicals causing limpets to lose their ability to cling to rocks, as well as shrimp swimming towards areas populated by predators.

www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-6253453/Antidepressants-pose-threat-wildlife-presence-water-supplies-say-experts.html