Canadian waters are contaminated with a range of pharmaceutical drugs, turning rivers and streams into a toxic soup with unknown dangers to people and wildlife, according to a study obtained by CTV News.

Painkillers, anti-inflammatories and prescription drugs used to treat epilepsy and blood cholesterol were found in waters near sewage treatment plants across the country, according to the first Canadian study of the problem paid for in part by Environment Canada and obtained under the Access to Information Act.

For years, Canadian scientists suspected that many drugs were passing through sewage plants and flowing into lakes and rivers as treated effluent, but there was little research on the subject outside of Europe.

The study surveyed water samples near sewage treatment plants at 14 Canadian cities as well as open water at various points along the Great Lakes. It is the first study to confirm the extent problem in Canada.

"(It proves) drug contamination does occur in the Canadian environment and North America context," said Chris Metcalfe, professor of Environment and Resource Studies at Trent University in Peterborough, Ont., who headed the research team that conducted the study.

"In some cases we're actually getting higher concentrations of these drugs than what we see in Europe."

Researchers found the drugs in extremely low concentrations, in some cases one part per billion and one part per trillion. In other tests, Metcalfe and scientists at Environment Canada's National Water Research Institute in Burlington, Ont., discovered antibiotics, Prozac and drugs common in birth control pills.

It's unclear what impact the drugs are having on people and wildlife. But scientists worry about people with allergies to drugs and the effect of mixing different drugs together, as well as building resistance to antibiotics. In laboratory tests, trace drugs that disrupt hormones can turn male fish into females.

"I don't think we really know what the impacts are," said Metcalfe.

"But what we're concerned about is that these drugs are designed to have certain effects at low concentrations."

Scientists stress the importance of the fact that the drugs are found in minute levels in lakes and rivers near sewage treatment plants, not drinking water, so people are not necessarily consuming them. But they also point out that no Canadian studies have looked at whether drugs are found in drinking water, either in wells or out of the tap.

Mark Servos, a research scientist at the National Water Research Institute, says Environment Canada studies are now being established to look at drinking water, adding that it was only recently that technology has become available to test for trace amounts of drugs in water.

"We don't really have enough data to answer those kinds of questions yet," said Mr. Servos. "It's a really new issue. People have not thought of drugs as environmental contaminants until the last four or five years."

The study, which was conducted between 2000 and 2001, has been submitted for peer review and has not yet been published. But scientists at the National Water Research Institute have duplicated the study with the same results, said Mr. Servos.

"We're pretty sure if you go to a sewage treatment plant anywhere in Canada you're going to find prescription and non-prescription drugs."

The research proves prescription drugs are a problem that cannot be flushed away. Scientists say sewage treatment plants were never designed to cope with pharmaceutical drugs. Even in Calgary, a city with one of the most advanced treatment facilities in North America, the drugs were found in samples taken as treated water enters the Bow River, a glacier-fed waterway renowned for its pristine condition.

Even so, John Jagorinec, a lab operations supervisor with the city said he was not surprised with the results, adding that Calgary is working with researchers to test for other drugs.

"Everyone uses pharmaceuticals from time to time," said Jagorinec.

"Inevitably we end up flushing those drugs down the toilet in one form or another."

Governments must crank up research and testing for the drugs while updating sewage treatment plants to ensure they do not end up in the drinking water, said Metcalfe.

With a growing and aging population, he says the amount of drugs in the water will only get worse.

"Things aren't going to get better in terms of the concentrations of drugs and other contaminants in the environment unless we take steps now."