British shrimp 'getting high on Prozac'

Shrimp around the coasts of Britain are getting high on antidepressants. Sea life is being exposed to potentially damaging amounts of chemicals found in the drug Prozac, researchers at the University of Portsmouth, in southern England, discovered. In tests, the small crustaceans were exposed to the same levels of fluoxetine as found in British waste waters.

Scientists found that the test shrimp were five times more likely to swim toward the light instead of away from it, making the creatures more likely to be eaten by fish or birds. The change in behavior could potentially devastate the shrimp population.

“Crustaceans are crucial to the food chain and if shrimps’ natural behavior is being changed because of antidepressant levels in the sea this could seriously upset the natural balance of the ecosystem,” said Dr Alex Ford. “It’s no surprise that what we get from the pharmacy will also be contaminating the country’s waterways.”

He said that some shrimps were taking on the excreted prescription drugs of whole towns. Prescriptions for antidepressants have risen rapidly in recent years, according to offical statistics. In 2002, there were 26.3 million antidepressant prescriptions handed out by doctors in England and Wales, yet the environmental effect of pharmaceuticals in sewage was largely unexplored.

There's an audio interview with Dr Ford here.