• DOI:10.1136/bmj.2.5203.941-a
• Corpus ID: 27830605

Sewage in the Sea

@article{Kershaw1960SewageIT,
  title={Sewage in the Sea},
  author={John D. Kershaw},
  journal={British Medical Journal},
  year={1960},
  volume={2},
  pages={941 - 942}
}

• J. Kershaw
• Published 24 September 1960
• Environmental Science
• British Medical Journal

Physically, I observed, the sewage does not go into infinite dilution but remains as a body or "plume of smoke" underwater for a very long time, and its deposition is usually along the sublittoral zone up to two miles on either side of the sewage point of a 30,000population group. If there is a storm, then surface drift may deposit pieces of sewage on a beach, but in ordinary weather it stays low down and sinks on to a 50to 100-yard broad area just outside the low-water ebb line (sublittoral zone). It is common in such a zone to find rockfish with large sores on the side of the body. The reduction in number of rockfish when an area becomes affected is a very prominent feature. The sessile rock and sand population shows evidence of pathology up to two miles from a sewage point. By pathology I mean that sand and rock anemones have part of the body shrunken and necrobiotic while molluscs show a high incidence of hydroids invading their shells. Shells are covered, as are the underwater algae, by a lower-grade filamentous algal growth as well as incrustation by polyzoan and gypsinian colonies. So are the corals. This lime incrustation is only evident in such grand manifestation where the sewage slime is present. The water itself is easily clouded by the thin often mucous slime, which floats upwards when disturbed. Because practically the whole of the pelagic and carnivorous sea life depends on the essential animalcule plant food-link along the shores, one can well imagine how essential it is to keep the shorelines over the world healthy from contamination of sea life. The direct effect on human beings and the indirect effect on them via the sea food has also not been investigated properly. It is not only a problem for England but it concerns the whole world, and I think should be taken up by a committee of a world body like United Nations.-1 am, etc.,