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What’s in That Bottle?
(Article from the Washington Post at Google)
Tuesday, March 30, 2004
As District health officials continue to recommend that pregnant women and children under 6 avoid D.C. Tap water because of elevated levels of lead in the water, bottled water is one alternative. But not all bottled water comes from a virgin spring high in the mountains. In fact, most don’t.
The nation’s two top-selling bottled waters, Pepsi’s Aquafina and
Coca-Cola’s Dasani, come from a wide variety of municipal water sources-- in other words, that crystal-clear liquid you’re buying is just some other city’s tap water. Be that as it may, both companies say they filter their water using a process that removes most contaminants, including lead.
But even such purified water isn’t always pristine. Last week Dasani
announced it was withdrawing its product from Britain because levels of
bromate, a potentially carcinogenic chemical, exceeded U.K. Legal limits.
Coke says that Dasani is processed differently in the United States than in Britain and that there’s little or no bromate in the product that’s bottled for sale in the United States.
Erik Olson, a senior attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), a nonprofit environmental action group, says Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulations for bottled water are not as strict as Environmental Protection Agency standards for tap water.
“We’re concerned that the testing that they have for bottled water is really inadequate. The FDA regulations are pretty weak,” Olson said.
A 1999 NRDC report on bottled water found that nearly a fourth of tested
waters violated California limits (the nation’s strictest) for arsenic and certain carcinogenic organic compounds. Nearly a third had levels of bacteria that exceeded the purity guidelines of some states. The group didn’t find any lead in the bottled water it sampled.
Loren Erick, general manager of the international bottled water program for NSF -- a nonprofit group that certifies consumer products -- says bottled water is generally safe and the type of bacteria mentioned in the NRDC report is not harmful. NSF tests bottled water annually for 144 contaminants and certifies products that meet both its standards and the FDA’s. Neither Dasani nor Aquafina sought certification from NSF, although both meet FDA standards.
For a list of bottled waters certified by NSF, go to www.nsf.org.
--Elizabeth Agnvall
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