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Blame it
on the organic vapors in tap water.
Bathing may result in cancer
Concluded in a recent study that the risk
accelerates in extended bathing or in confined space.
Lee
Tsong-yu/Taipei
Bathing can be hazardous to one’s health!
A direct result of the organic vapors, such as chlorine,
commonly found in tap water, as uncovered by Professor Wu Kuen-yu
at the Chinese Medical Institution’s department of vocational
safety and health education that the risk of contracting cancer as
a result of inhaling organic vapor in bathing among the local
population has surged to one in every million. The study also revealed that the risk tends to proportionally
increase as one spends more time bathing, or in a confined space.
Notwithstanding that the current regulations merely limit
the impact of organic vapor on drinking water once it enters the
human body but fail to address the danger when it is diffused into
the air, particularly when inhaled into the lungs while taking a
shower, the potential hazards can be long lasting. Backed by funding allocated by the National Council of
Science Development, Wu Kuen-yu has embarked on the “Study of
the Adaptation of a Toxicology Mechanism in Risk Assessment and
Endemic Research, which takes to measuring the respiratory of
adults to the bath water and amount of time spent bathing in
conducting a risk assessment based on six carcinogen vapors,
including chloride and carbonated chloride contained in tape
water, aiming to provide dependable references to the government
in establishing criteria for regulating harmful substances in tap
water.
Upon concluding a
questionnaire poll with 459 randomly selected respondents in the
Central area for establishing a general bathing pattern, the
findings concluded by Wu Kuen-yu comparing the current EPA
regulating criteria for assessing the local population’s
lifetime exposure to organic vapor inhaled while taking bath,
utilizing mean ratings of 7.5 liters of shower water, in a 7.5
cubic meter bathroom by a 70-year-old taking shower once a day,
indicated that the risk of exposure to carcinogens are recorded at
as high as 55.46 to 56.65 persons per million, or as low as 1.34
to 1.45 persons per million.
The assessment
findings also concluded that despite the EPA regulating criteria
on harmful substances being nearly identical to most
industrialized countries at the present time, the cancerous risks
are inadvertently alarming. A
word of advice by Wu Kuen-yu is that the Environmental Protection
Administration may want to consider lowering the regulating
criteria to best protect the general health, and that it is best
not to drink tap water without boiling under the present
regulating criteria. The
in-depth analysis by Wu Kuen-yu also concluded that as the bathing
time and bathroom size are singled out as the key factors in
determining the amount of carcinogens inhaled, the longer one
bathes or gets cooped up in a confined bathroom, the higher the
risk that one is more likely to contract cancer.
From:
China Post Jan. 2, 2002, Tsong-yu Lee
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