Fecal contamination of coastal waters causes many cases of gastrointestinal and respiratory illness. While environmental agencies do monitor water contamination, they do not look at beach sand, which can also harbor disease-causing germs.
"It's common knowledge that public beaches are closed sometimes because of high bacteria counts in the water. Health officials routinely monitor recreational beaches to measure what scientists call 'fecal indicator bacteria,' or FIB, which serves as a proxy indicating the presence of sewage-borne pathogens that can make swimmers sick.
FIB standards, recommended by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, have been established to protect the health of beachgoers. That's a good thing because, according to the latest data on infectious diseases caused by wastewater pollution in the marine environment, fecal contamination in coastal waters is estimated to cause more than 120 million cases of gastrointestinal illness and 50 million cases of respiratory disease each year around the world.
Problem is: Beach monitoring programs look at water samples, not the sanitary quality of beach sand, as the research of Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution graduate student Elizabeth Halliday and microbial ecologist Rebecca Gast highlights."
Sean Gonsalves reports for the Cape Cod Times May 27, 2012.
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