Attorney General Doug Gansler has joked with environmentalists that there are fish in the Potomac who “don?t know whether they?re boys or girls,” but he wasn?t kidding.
Now a legislative analyst for a Senate budget subcommittee is asking top officials at the Maryland Department of the Environment what?s going on and what they?re doing about it.
The short answer is they?re not exactly sure what?s causing the intersex fish, which are fish that have characteristics of both males and females. But new enhanced removal of nutrients may have the potential for helping the problem, senators were told Monday.
“It seems to be a more frequent occurrence in the Shenandoah and Potomac regions,” said scientist Robert Summers, new deputy secretary of the environment, who formerly headed the water management program. But it is not clear how widespread the problem is.
Some scientists have speculated that the changes in the fish, first found in 2005, are caused by drugs and hormones that get into the water system. Endocrine disrupters have drawn the most attention since they are capable of creating hormonal changes leading to reproductive abnormalities in fish.
“There may be a linkage,” said Summers. The Chesapeake Bay Restoration program, which is paying to beef up nutrient removal at wastewater treatment plants around the Bay, may help to remove the suspect pharmaceuticals.
State officials are letting the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency take the lead on the problem, said Shari Wilson, new secretary of the environment. “Research is under way.”
“Essentially, it is a national issue,” and the EPA will determine what regulatory steps might be, she said.
The EPA is expected to issue a report by the end of the year on the occurrence and concentrations of pharmaceuticals and personal care products in fish tissue, MDE officials said.
There is list of “emerging contaminant issues” that are becoming known, Summers said, and wastewater systems are currently not designed to remove these substances.
