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Water laps at the Birdsville pub. (ABC News: David Brook)
Authorities have rescued a woman and child caught in floodwaters at Charleville in Qld’s south-west.
Their car washed away in floodwaters near Bradley’s Gully, which runs through Charleville.
Authorities are also preparing to evacuate some residents and businesses at Charleville.
Rivers in the region are rising and authorities are preparing for the worst as Charleville gets drenched with more than 140 millimetres of rain.
In the far south-west, Birdsville and Bedourie remain isolated by floodwaters.
Several houses in Charleville have been evacuated and one school has been closed as floodwaters in Bradley’s Gully continue to rise.
Murweh Mayor Mark O’Brien says the Gully is at 2.2 metres and crews are sandbagging about 12 properties.
He says the creek is expected to rise another half-a-metre.
“Once it goes over that level, we do get flooding in the low-lying houses and businesses although some of them have already got water through them,” he said.
“Although that’s the next level that we don’t really want to reach, but somewhere in the next six to 12 hours I’d expect that there’ll be a considerable rise in the [Bradley’s] Gully.”
A band of heavy rain continues to move across southern parts of Queensland.
Authorities are monitoring rising floodwaters in Queensland’s southern inland at Mitchell and Roma.
The State Emergency Service (SES) and residents are sand-bagging low-lying properties in Roma.
Maranoa Mayor Rob Loughnan says more than 120 millimetres has fallen in the area overnight and that has cut major highways and turned local creeks into raging rivers.
Councillor Loughnan says they are also monitoring the river at Mitchell.
“The Maranoa river has got a very big run in it and we’re certainly monitoring that at the moment,” he said.
“Certainly a big run as big as the run in 1990 I’m told 0 it looks like a flood situation over there.”
Meanwhile, a woman had to be rescued after the car she was in was caught in floodwaters near Roma around 6:30am AEST.
In the south-east, the heaviest falls have been on the Sunshine Coast but persistent rain in Brisbane, Ipswich and on the Gold Coast is causing creeks to rise.
To the Editor: Cumberland Times-News
February 28, 2010 — The Pure Water Committee of Western Maryland Inc. was formed in 1960 as a grass roots network of citizens with a 50-year-old mission to educate the public of the complete fraud of the practice called water fluoridation.
Recently, it has come to my attention in an engineering report for the city of Boulder, Colo., that they did an evaluation of fluoridation chemicals and sources and found that much of the fluoride chemicals used for water fluoridation are now coming out of China with arsenic and lead levels of 50 and 40 milligrams respectively per bag and non-existent regulatory monitoring of the salt or acid compounds from these imports.
This type of trade from a country with a track record of lead paint on toys to antifreeze in cough syrup medicine is completely unacceptable.
After visiting the Frostburg Water Filtration Plant on Feb. 23, it has come to my attention that Frostburg has sodium fluoride bags with no source or import information on them.
Only after I asked for the certificate of analysis from Solvay fluorides through Univar USA, which is the chemical supplier for the Frostburg Water Plant, did I receive the certificate of analysis from Shanghai Mintchem Development Co., LTD., the Chinese manufacture of the sodium fluoride.
The material safety data sheets from Solvay fluorides shows that a teaspoon amount of 5 grams of sodium fluoride can be fatal to an average size man of 70kg.
In toxicological information section, chronic toxicity by oral route may cause skeletal and dental fluorosis, thyroid, testes, kidney, liver, ambiguous carcinogenic and mutagenic effects, fetotoxic and fertility effects.
I have asked now for two years for the Frostburg Mayor and Council to put in the water bill for area residence the ADA warning to not to use fluoridated water when making infant formula, but to no avail.
I have showed them the 2003 sixth edition PDR special warning section for Luride (sodium fluoride in pill form) that children under the age of six should not be taking the same equivalent dose that municipalities add to the drinking water.
I asked them why they would continue this practice when the PDR states that not even a dentist or doctor should be administering this equivalent dose to a child under the age of 6.
I have explained to them that the warning label on fluoride toothpaste states, that if you swallow more than a pea size amount of paste or .25 milligrams of fluoride, which is the equivalent dose of 8 ounces of fluoridated water, you should contact the poison control center immediately.
We can no longer trust our local governments to do the right thing for its citizens. I find it so ironic that the same federal government that is demanding small communities under the clean water act, like Mount Savage to join to the Frostburg Regional water supply, because of an overt concern over possible ground water contamination, then allows this toxic waste byproduct from China to enter this country and be added to this same regional water supply.
Are we insane?
Instead of the city of Frostburg being honest with me over this imported chemical use and stopping this harmful practice, they seem more concerned over my visit to the water plant to obtain this information.
This is a serious homeland security matter for Frostburg and many other fluoridated communities, including Cumberland. Please contact both Frostburg and Cumberland elected officials and ask for this practice to be halted immediately.
Bernard W. Miltenberger
Frostburg
A joint research carried out by Tokyo Institute of Technology and National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST) found that the water samples in the Southern Punjab were having arsenic level above 10 ppb of the WHO standards.
“The World Health Organisation (WHO) has set a standard of 10 ppb for safe drinking water in respect of arsenic whereas the level of fluorides should be less that 1.5 ppm,” The Nation quoted Dr. Attiqur Rehman, postdoctoral research fellow at AIST, as saying.
Dr Attiq further said that it was a matter of great concern that even in cities like Lahore, where the WASA claimed the provision of high quality of water, the level of arsenic was almost five times higher than the WHO standards.
The geological phenomenon is believed to be the main reason of its presence in the area.
However, groundwater contamination is also associated with the extensive use of pesticides and insecticides for agricultural purpose in these areas.
Arsenic is difficult to detect while ingesting, as it is tasteless, odourless and colourless and its effects are not immediately visible.
According to the official statistics of in Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital and Research Centre in Southern Punjab, 197,730 patients were given chemotherapy treatment, 33,789 patients were surgically operated, 362,579 patients got radiation therapy, 717,562 got imaging studies, 12,777,051 pathology tests were conducted in this hospital whereas pharmacy was dispense to 5,416,988 patients.
“There is a need to conduct some research to determine the relation of high rate of cancer patients from those areas where arsenic and fluoride level is very high,” Dr. Attiq said. (ANI)
Map: Jerilderie 2716 Posted March 1, 2010 12:10:00 ABC Riverina
Murray and Riverina councils in New South Wales are again calling for an end to water buybacks.
The F division meeting of the Local Government and Shires Association (LGSA) in Jerilderie has resolved to make urgent representations to the NSW Water Minister Phil Costa.
Divisional chairman Lindsay Renwick from Deniliquin says the Minister must act to stop the destruction of communities from the accelerated water buybacks negotiated by South Australian Senator Nick Xenophon.
“We really demanded that LGSA go hard at it and stop this rot. Somebody’s got to go out there and grab it by the throat and get this water buyback all stopped,” Mr Renwick said.
“The cheese hole effect that’s happening all throughout this region where they’re buying all this water, long-term it’s going to ruin the whole of this area down here.”
Water shortage concerns are also set to dominate talks when western councils meet for their annual conference in Bourke today.
The Western Division of the Shires Association covers 40 per cent of the state, taking in the Bogan, Bourke, Brewarrina, Central Darling, Cobar, Lachlan, Moree Plains, Walgett, Hay, Carrathool, Balranald and Wentworth councils.
They are gathering to discuss increases in water allocations, objections to buybacks under the new Murray-Darling Basin plan and a push to standardise water restrictions across the state.
The divisional president and Central Darling Shire Mayor, Ray Longfellow, says roads funding and policing will also be key issues.
“They are the problems that are not being addressed by the government of the day,” he said.
A regional law and order strategy and tougher penalties for repeat offenders are also on the agenda.
DEBORAH GOUGH
February 21, 2010 The Age
SCORES of starving and pain-ridden kangaroos have been culled after developing tooth and bone deformities from breathing and ingesting fluoride emissions.
Many more are believed to be suffering from growths that will kill them.
The affected kangaroos are living near the Alcoa aluminium smelter in Portland, in the state’s south-west, and the Austral Bricks factory at Craigieburn.
Autopsies performed at Melbourne University on 49 kangaroos culled at Alcoa on a single day last year found all but one were suffering from flurosis, which leads to excessive bone growths, or lesions, on joints in the paws, ankles and calves.
It can also cause tooth and jaw deformities that hinder eating and foraging.
The Sunday Age has been told more than 200 ill kangaroos living near both affected sites have been culled in recent years, but this figure could not be confirmed.
The Environment Protection Authority was first warned of the effect of fluoride dust and fumes on kangaroos living near the Alcoa smelter in 2005, although lameness was detected in some animals grazing there as early as 2001.
Jenny Charles, associate professor in veterinary pathology at Melbourne University, said research had found that up to 90 per cent of the roughly 130 kangaroos living at the Portland site had some form of flurosis on their teeth and a quarter had visible limb lumps.
Dr Charles said autopsies on Craigieburn kangaroos showed lower levels of fluoride in their systems, but the effects of flurosis seemed to be worse. Other foraging animals may also be affected.
Wildlife Victoria alerted the Department of Sustainability and Environment to the plight of the Craigieburn kangaroos in 2008. Wildlife shelter operator Manfred Zabinskas told The Sunday Agelast week that he had been horrified when he saw how many kangaroos were sick. ”They were in real pain,” he said.
EPA director of environmental services Bruce Dawson denied the authority had been slow to reduce maximum emission levels.
He said that while the levels were safe for humans, it was now clear they were too high for some animals and a new level was likely.
However it could take years before research indicated what that level should be.
”We are taking this seriously. Clearly the impact on the local kangaroos and vegetation is not acceptable and action is required,” Mr Dawson said.
He said research by Melbourne University would help guide the EPA’s actions.
Neither Alcoa nor Austral Bricks has been in breach of their licences to emit fluoride, but Mr Dawson said the EPA had demanded that Austral ‘’significantly reduce” its fluoride emissions by building new facilities and upgrading technologies.
He said Alcoa had been advised to limit the kangaroos’ access to contaminated foliage and the EPA was investigating whether the smelter could reduce its emissions.
Mr Dawson said there were plans to herd the kangaroos away from the most polluted areas.
Latest federal National Pollutant Inventory figures show Alcoa’s Portland plant is Victoria’s largest emitter of fluoride dust, with 120 tonnes a year.
Austral Bricks’ three plants at its Craigieburn site is second largest with a combined total of 66 tonnes a year. The largest Victorian emitter of fluoride overall is Melbourne Water.
Austral Bricks’ Victorian general manager, Peter Caughey, said a $75 million expansion of the company’s newest plant, which would phase out old technologies, was expected to reduce fluoride emissions by between 76 and 86 per cent once works were completed in 2011.
He did not admit emissions from the brickworks were affecting the nearby kangaroos, but said the company was taking a cautious approach.
The Alcoa kangaroos live on the 500-hectare Portland Aluminium site, known as the ”Smelter in the Park”.
The park’s operations manager, John Osborne, said the company had taken steps over the years - including incrementally reducing its emission level and funding the Melbourne University research - to tackle the kangaroo problem.
”We are deeply concerned by the potential for low-level emissions to affect the health of any animal grazing close to the smelter and will look for further improvement opportunities,” he said.
Wildlife Victoria chief executive Sandy Fernee said the situation was urgent. Kangaroos were being forced out of their territories and left with contaminated land.
WATER policies in Victoria’s north have led to a lack of faith in the future of the irrigated dairy industry says PETER WALSH
The closure of Murray-Goulburn’s cheese-making factory in Leitchville is a sure sign that northern Victorian irrigators have lost confidence in the Brumby Government.
There’s no doubt drought and commodity price fluctuations have had an impact on agriculture in northern Victoria but farmers have weathered drought and price changes in the past.
The reality is that the Brumby Government’s water policies have left producers questioning the future of the irrigated food sector.
The Brumby Government’s decision to allow the unbundling of water rights, lift water trading protections and allow the Commonwealth to enter the water market has producers doubting its commitment to irrigated food production.
There is also anger and confusion about the way the Government has gone about its supposed irrigation upgrade in the Goulburn Murray Water area.
For many, the illusion of a modernised irrigation system has turned into a nightmare.
The Government has set out to achieve its promised savings by closing down at least 60 per cent of the system. More than half of high security water right in northern Victoria will be traded away from food production by 2015.
The price of irrigation water could double within five years for those left in the industry.
These polices have made the devastating economic decline of communities such as Leitchville inevitable.
The Premier doesn’t seem to realise that he can have food or he can have water. He cannot have bo
Crop expansion: Indigenous people fear they could be exploited (ABC News: Brad Markham)
Many Indigenous people in Australia’s north fear agricultural development, the Northern Australia Indigenous Land and Sea Management Alliance says.
A Federal Government-commissioned taskforce has concluded the north is not suitable for widespread agricultural development.
But the taskforce says some crops could be expanded, especially fodder for cattle.
The chief executive of the alliance, Joe Morrison, says Indigenous people fear they could be exploited.
“When we hear words to the effect that it’s an opportunity to create a northern food bowl and those sorts of things it just puts fear in the minds of people who are resident here,” Mr Morrison said.
“We certainly don’t want to go down the track that’s been well-trodden before in terms of disadvantaging, particularly Indigenous people, further.”
A member of the taskforce, Professor Bob Wasson from Charles Darwin University, says while it is unrealistic to insist that rivers remain untouched, Indigenous industries need them to be in good condition.
“It’s not just water in a bucket, it’s water in a river, water in a wetland, water in a functioning ecosystem,” he said.
“And that’s what we’ve got to maintain in northern Australia while developing opportunities for livelihoods for Indigenous people because, frankly, that’s the big social issue which we have not yet solved.”
The president of the National Farmers Federation, David Crombie, says there needs to be more information about water availability in the country’s north.
“Everybody knew it wasn’t just as simple as transferring southern agriculture holus-bolus up north,” he said.
“But look, there are opportunities.
“The big constraint I guess at the moment is the absence of good data on water.
“We need to generate better data on water availability and better data on the interconnectivity of ground water and surface water.”
The Federal Opposition says there are far more opportunities to develop northern Australia for agriculture than the taskforce has concluded.
The Opposition’s spokesman on northern and remote Australia, Senator Ian Macdonald, says there are plenty of opportunities for development.
“Nobody ever thought we were going to be planting crops from Cairns to Broome on every square inch of soil,” he said.
“What we wanted was real leadership, a way to look forward, to provide some of the food that Australia is going to desperately need as the south of our continent gets drie
By Stuart Gary for ABC Science Online
Food production needs to be increased at unprecedented rates if we are to keep the world fed (ABC News: Brad Markham)
A new report by Australian researchers claims far more needs to be done if we are to feed the estimated 9 billion people who will be living on the planet by 2050.
The report, by Professor Mark Tester and Professor Peter Langridge of the Australian Centre for Plant Functional Genomics at the University of Adelaide, appears today in the journal Science.
“The simple fact is while food production has increased by 32 million tonnes a year, an annual increase of 44 million tonnes a year is what’s actually needed to meet the food targets for 2050 set down by the World Summit on Food security,” Professor Tester said.
“But this represents a 38 per cent increase over historical improvements in food production and it needs to be sustained for the next 40 years.
“This scale of increase is unprecedented and will require huge changes to current food production methods.”
Climate change
Professor Tester says our ability to increase or sustain crop yields and quality is being tested by changes to the environment caused by global warming and the growth in biofuels.
“Increasing food production in a stable environment would be challenging enough, but given the dynamic global environmental changes now occurring, it will be even harder, but not impossible,” he said.
The report says there will be some benefits from climate change, such as increasing CO2 levels acting as a fertiliser and rising temperatures increasing growth in higher latitudes and altitudes.
But it also means more damaging high temperature events, new pest and disease pressures and altered drought and rainfall patterns.
Professor Tester warns the current diversion of food into the production of biofuels is putting even further pressure on world food supplies.
“It’s obscenity that such a huge percentage of the maize crop is going into biofuel production when children are starving,” he said.
“We need biofuels, but we should use different feed stocks such as algal bio-diesel which won’t impact world food stocks.”
Impact on Australia
Earlier this week, the Northern Australia Land and Water Taskforce released a report that concluded northern Western Australia is unlikely to become South East Asia’s next food bowl.
Professor Tester says this is a pity, but believes Australia has enough to sustain a growing population.
“Australia grows more than enough to feed itself, even if our population were to be double the 36 million expected by 2050,” he said.
But he warns other countries face an uncertain future.
“India, which has more undernourished people than Africa, is a real challenge,” he said.
“Especially with their government’s hard stand on genetically modified foods.”
Professor Tester believes new breeding technologies are needed to increase crop yields by quickly identifying the best genes for any given conditions.
“Facilities like the Australian Centre for Plant Functional Genomics will help to quickly identify plant varieties that will grow successfully,” he said.
“This is the way forward if we are to feed the world in the future.”
Article from: 
Kristin Shorten
BOWEN residents have been issued with a ‘Boil Water Alert’ after E. coli was found in the town’s water supply.
The Whitsunday Regional Council issued the warning yesterday after recent tests on the Bowen water system found the bacteria, medically termed Escherichia coli.
The council said water used for drinking, cooking, washing raw foods and personal hygiene should be boiled for three minutes and allowed to cool before use.
Recent rainfall contributed to the presence of the bacteria in the water supply, the council said.
Whitsunday Regional Mayor Mike Brunker said E. coli was not generally harmful but its presence indicated the water could be contaminated with more harmful organisms.
Residents were advised to take precautions until further notice.
Queensland Health supplied a written statement that said the treatment of the water supply had been ineffective and lead to the continuing detection of E.coli.
“The local council is required to provide a safe drinking water supply under the Public Health Act. However, repeated tests have found the presence of E.coli, which indicates ineffective treatment of the water,” the statement said.
“Queensland Health will continue to work closely with the relevant council to assess the health risk to the community and determine the appropriate response.”
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The drugs and chemicals in drinking water issue may be a socially and chemically complicated issue, however the solution is simple: the water- responsible consumer. DrugsInDrinkingWater.com challenges the Nation to take up this new facet of recycling
Water is an issue of growing concern in the US, an issue that may well soon surpass that of oil. DrugsInDrinkingWater.com has just been launched in an effort to help raise consumer awareness and responsibility in a new phase of recycling: the water returning to the system from household showers, sinks, and washing machines. DrugsInDrinkingWater.com challenges the Nation to take up this new facet of recycling with their motto America’s Water Flows Through You.
Of prime concern is that of prescription drugs in our water from use and disposal, and artificial sweeteners and personal care products used or excess disposed of. DrugsInDrinkingWater.com is a proponent of point of use treatment, both influent (incoming) and effluent (outgoing), as proactive method for concerned consumers to do something about water issues today. The website also urges cooperation with water utilities and sponsorship by government action, mandates and incentives.
54.1% of household waste water is easily treated by the consumer. Faucet, shower and laundry water are all points of use that filtration or traps may be used to reduce consumer contaminates before the contaminates enter the water system. There is no need for development of new technologies, as the technologies for home water treatment are available on the internet. For less than $500.00 the average home can install a laundry waste water filter, a kitchen grease trap, a shower filter, and drinking water filtration. The homeowner would effectively reduce the number of consumer contaminates in 54.1% of the household Wastewater before the Wastewater reenters the water utility system.
A pro-active consumer can start today, instituting permanent changes in lifestyle and simple technological changes easily as economics permits. Water filter usage is simple and easy to start today. Water treatment on a household level has the available technology to reduce much of the contaminates in the water of the water system on the counter top, at the faucet or shower head and whole-house systems.
There are 407 water utilities serving over 100,000 people. A 30 day consumer drive with cost incentives and rebates could get 100,000 household point of use water treatment systems installed. Consumers and water utilities need to share cost and responsibilities in the American Drinking Water Crisis.
For basic how-to’s and filtration information, go to http://drugsindrinkingwater.com.
Contact:
Edward Hemway
sundragon1@comcast.net
www.drugsindrinkingwater.com
561.577.7202
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