Tuesday, 21 November 2023

Going Swimmingly?

in 2023, the pressure group Surfers Against Sewage arranged for 'citizen scientists' to take weekly water samples, over the complete bathing season, from 40 inland UK locations. Twenty were popular river bathing sites and 20 upstream of nearby sewage overflows. All the samples were analysed to Environment Agency (EA) standards. Pollution rendered 60% of the bathing spots currently unsafe for swimming (https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/nov/21/most-inland-bathing-spots-in-uk-have-unsafe-levels-of-pollution-report-finds). In 2023, nearly 2000 cases of serious sickness in UK swimmers were linked to sewage pollution. This is three times the figure for 2022. Clearly, sewage pollution from the UK's privatised Water Companies is increasingly making people ill, even in designated, inland 'wild swimming' spots. Why isn't the EA itself monitoring safety in such locations more carefully? It surely care of the environment shouldn't be the responsibility of pressure groups and charities!
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