Chlorinated water linked to rectal and bladder cancers

The straits times, Thursday, July 2, 1992

WASHINGTON-Chlorine, the chemical used to purify most of the US water supply, produced chemical by-products that caused a significant number of cases of rectal and bladder cancers each year, medical researchers said on Tuesday.

At least 18 per cent of rectal cancers, or about 6,500 cases a year , and 9 per cent of bladder cancers, or about 4,200 cases a year, could be linked to drinking and bathing and showering in chlorinated water, they wrote in the American Journal of Public Health.

It has been known since 1974 that chlorine combines with organic compounds in water other dangerous chemicals such as chloroform.  Several studies have implicated these by-products as causes of cancer.

Dr. Rober Morris and colleagues reached their conclusions after examining 10 previous studies on the cancers-causing ability of chlorinated water.  Said Dr. Morris : "There is a clear pattern between consumption of chlorinated water and rectal and bladder cancers."

The study was conducted at the Medical Collage of Wisconsin, where he is an epidemiologist, and at the Harvard School of Public Health.

Public water supplies depend on chlorine to kill disease-causing bacteria and to keep it pure in storage tanks and pipes.  About three-fourths of the water supply in the US is chlorinated.

However, the authors and other experts stressed that the new study should not lead to stopping chlorination.  "The potential health risks of microbial contamination of drinking water greatly exceed the risks" of cancer, the author said.

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