Scientists and the president-elect of the New England Water Works Association freely acknowledged that resident critics of chloramine, the anti-bacterial agent the city has begun using to prevent a repeat of last summer's boil water marathon, are correct in noting the additive is hardly perfect.
But the experts over and over tried to ease community anxieties Tuesday night by emphasizing that the formula's track record, and the best lab and clinical research all point to chloramine as the best option available — and the one Gloucester has committed to in its expensively retrofitted, aging water delivery system.
The point was most poignantly made by the tall, bow-tied Jeffrey Griffith, a member of the faculty at Tufts University's Department of Public Health and Community Medicine. The first of three experts brought to the special City Council meeting by the city's public works and engineering staff to exchange reports with chloramine's local critics and skeptics, Griffith told the city he was confident chloramine was the best of the imperfect options.
"I swore an oath to protect the public health," Griffith said. "You have to have something in the pipes."
He said chloramine is far less harmful than chlorine, which had been the disinfectant until recently. Chlorine, he said, has been responsible for "about 3,000 prostate cancer deaths a year," miscarriages and birth defects.
Also appearing for the city were David B. Paris, the longtime water administrator for Manchester, N.H., and the incoming president of the New England Water Works Association, and David Reckhow, from the faculty of University of Massachusetts at Amherst; his specialization is disinfection and its byproducts.
At the start of the evening, Patricia Murphy, a Gloucester resident, nurse and citizen activist in a grassroots campaign aimed at exposing the problems associated with chloramine, was deeply worried about the uncertainties and unknowns associated with chloramine.
Murphy spoke for herself and also on behalf of Susan Pickford, a Pennsylvania lawyer and anti-chloramine activist who had planned to appear to balance the experts on the other side, but was unable to make the date.
Murphy described chloramine as subject to "emerging science and imperfect knowledge," claims that Griffith readily conceded.
Concerns about the potential harm caused by chloramine has spiked again this week after the deaths of some residents' pet fish. The potential harm caused to the aquatic animals and amphibian by the chloramine in the tap water had been flagged to the community by the city as the transition to chloramine began July 9. However, products to mitigate the danger to water creatures are available, a city circular noted.
Murphy illustrated her concern about the unknown by referring to the discovery that the use of chloramines in the Washington, D.C. system in the early years of the decade produced dangerously high levels of lead in pipes and children's blood, causing irreversible brain damage.
Gloucester has iron, not lead, pipes. But Griffith agreed with Murphy about the tragedy in Washington. He called the incident "criminal," but didn't waver in contending that chloramine in the city's iron pipes was a "reduction" in risk.
Paris said he had been a "chlorine fan," but as he studied the byproducts of disinfectents, "was converted to chloramine."
Reckhow agreed, saying, "Chlorine has the largest mount of byproducts."
In the aftermath of last summer's 20-day boil order after indicator bacteria were found in tests, the state issued mandates and left no doubt that Gloucester would be required to use chloramine.
In New England, about 3.4 million people are ingesting chloramines in their drinking water, and the chemicals compounds are in use in the water systems of Dallas, Tampa, Houston, San Francisco and in Massachusetts Water Resources Authority communities.
Officials also noted that no new reports of indicator bacteria have been made so far this summer despite the record heat.
Since last summer, the city has sped through $8 million in upgrades, which are removing 89 percent of all the organic matter that floats in the water pulled from the Babson Reservoir, up from 60 percent with the pre-modernized plant.
Richard Gaines can be reached at 978-283-7000, x3464, or rgaines@gloucestertimes.com.
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