Chicago's water: Fertility juice?

While at a wedding this past weekend, I met a nice young lady who was interested in talking about my job reporting health news in Chicago. A Chicagoan herself, she said she was interested in knowing what kind of chemicals are in our drinking water. Specifically, she mentioned hormones, drugs, painkillers and the like. I told her it was a great idea, and I would look into it.

Well, I don't have to now, because the Tribune did the work for me. Michael Hawthorne reports that there are small amounts of many drugs and other unseemly things in our drinking water:

Chicago officials didn't start conducting their own tests [to determine drugs in drinking water] until last year, after a Tribune investigation found small amounts of pharmaceuticals and other unregulated chemicals in samples of the city's tap water.

The city collected samples of treated Lake Michigan water four times in 2008. According to results posted on the city's Web site, the tests found small amounts of the sex hormones testosterone and progesterone; gemfibrozil, a prescription cholesterol-fighting drug; ibuprofen, an over-the-counter painkiller, and DEET, the active ingredient in bug spray.

The tests also found caffeine, nicotine and cotinine, a nicotine byproduct, all of which researchers consider to be indicators of pharmaceuticals from human waste.

More details on the report can be found HERE and HERE.

UPDATE: The city report can be found HERE.