EPA moves forward with plan to remove microplastics, chemicals from drinking water

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced measures to protect drinking water. In conjunction with the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), the agency headed Lee Zeldin moved forward on a plan to eliminate microplastics, pharmaceuticals and other chemicals present in water.

Specifically, the EPA released the draft of the Sixth Candidate Contaminant List (CCL 6). This is a tool provided for in the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA), which allows the government to drive "research, funding and future decisions on the regulation of emerging threats to public water systems."

This procedure is part of a statutory obligation established by the SDWA, which requires a list of potential contaminants in water to be updated every five years.

In this way, the Trump Administration is putting the presence of toxic chemicals in drinking water under the microscope. From now on, the listed contaminants can be monitored nationwide, investigated with public funds and evaluated for possible regulation.

"For too long, Americans have vocalized concerns about plastics and pharmaceuticals in their drinking water. That ends today," EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin said in a statement.

By placing microplastics and pharmaceuticals on the Contaminant Candidate List for the first time ever, EPA is sending a clear message: we will follow the science, we will pursue answers, and we will hold ourselves to the highest standards to protect the health of every American family," he added.

Just minutes after the statement was released, Zeldin led a table with Health and Human Services Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr., who explained the seriousness of the issue of microplastics in drinking water.

"Researchers have detected microplastics in human blood, lung tissue, liver, kidneys, and even blood cells. Studies have found that more than 80% of people tested for it. One analysis estimates that the average person ingests tens of thousands of microplastic particles in each unit of food, water, and air. Another study reports concentrations in the brain in equivalent amounts to roughly a spoonful of plastic in every human brain. And this number, by the way, has gone up by 50% since 2016. And inevitably, it's going to go up, actually, if we continue along the same road," he said.