Pollution from the combined activities, actions, and behaviors of the public: Pharmaceuticals and personal care products. NorCal SETAC News 14

Paint-by-number pictures of environmental pollution have long been envisioned by the laity — pollution created by the broad brush of dreary industry smokestacks and pipelines carrying liquids of unknown origin. While these stereotyped images may have faded with the implementation of numerous environmental regulations, and while pollution is now more surreptitious, the perception persists nonetheless that it's "them " rather than "me " behind whatever forms of pollution remain. The realization that pollution can result from the combined activities, actions, and behaviors of multitudes of individuals has really only been appreciated by the public with more obvious forms of pollution such as smog and litter. That more subtle forms of pollution emanate from the actions, activities, and behaviors of each individual has remained relatively obscure. A more accurate rendition of pollution is painted with many small brushes at the intricate interfaces in the interplay of industry and the individual — via consumerism — leading to a complex mixture of countless point- and dispersed-source origins. This paper touches on a variety of issues involving chemical pollution that can result from the multitudes of consumer end-uses for a vast armamentarium of pharmaceuticals and personal care products (PPCPs). More specifically, this paper outlines some of the more important as well as the less appreciated aspects of this many-faceted, multidimensioned "emerging " issue