 The source for the New York City water supply was recently tested for the occurrence of pharmaceutical and personal care products. As I talked about in one of my previous videos, many of the drugs we take are excreted in our urine and can end up polluting our waterways. What about New York City? Well, they found trace amounts of drugs like tauanol, ibuprofen, stimulants like nicotine caffeine, hormones like estrone and testosterone, somatobiotics, a barbiturate, valium. The levels they found were extremely low, though, well under the New York safety standards. The concern is bioaccumulation. Does it build up in the flesh of fish swimming in it? Well, in a national study of the occurrence of pharmaceuticals and personal care products in fish, they did find, for example, Prozac metabolized in fish fillets at levels higher than that found in the surrounding water. But before one considers eating fish to improve their mood, though that these drugs are mostly concentrated in the brains of fish, and a recent Harvard study looked at fish consumption and depression, the Harvard Nurses study, and their findings do not support a protective effect of the long chain omega-3s from fish on depression risk. Though they do support the hypothesis that higher ALA, the plant-based omega-3 found in flax seeds and walnuts, may reduce depression risk.