news release
    22nd Mar 2005

Surfers Against Sewage (SAS) wrote the report, “There is no such thing as too much information” in March 2003. The report calls for authorities to embrace clearer public signage on the beach that would protect the public’s health from polluted water during recreation.

SAS has delivered this report to every head of Environmental Health throughout the UK in March 2003. SAS have attended and often spoke at conferences on public signage on the beach. SAS has also been campaigning hard to get better public signage on the political agenda.

Bathing Water Results for 2004 have dipped for the first time in years. This was predominately blamed on the extreme weather events, particularly the heavy rainfall the region fell victim to during August. When heavy rainfall occurs the typical sewage treatment works is unable to cope with the flows of wastewater and sewage and so has to discharge this polluting mixture to rivers and streams through Combined Sewage and Stormwater Overflows (CSO’s). This can make water quality poor and increase the risk of sickness in people using the beach for recreation. Over the last 2 summers SAS has become increasingly concerned at the lack of information beachgoers receive to inform them of the risks of using certain bathing waters. We have recorded several health incidents involving groups of water users that highlights elevated levels of sickness in people that use a ‘body of water’ which was suffering from faecal contamination. Summer 2004 saw SAS investigate Impetigo cases at Gwithian that coincided with bathing water quality that failed the minimum European standards at the beach.

Whilst at Watergate Bay a multi agency investigation was held to try and identify an outbreak of Ecoli 0157 amongst children using the beach. Whilst no clear source was found, all those that were sick had been using the stream on the beach to play in. Both incidents saw local authorities issue temporary warning notices, which SAS welcomed, but in the main many pollution incidents go unreported to the public by local authorities. A clear and improved signage system that mapped sewage discharge points, location of CSO’s and informed public that water quality would suffer during and after heavy rainfall would allow water users to make more informed decisions for themselves about when to use the water. It would also reduce the number of people that fall sick as a result of bathing, swimming or surfing in polluted water, less time spent by GP’s in administering such cases and reducing the number of sick days lost at work.

SAS continues to work with many councils in the South West as well as the Marine Conservation Society and the RNLI. SAS is pleased to hear that public signage to protect water users from polluted water is now been discussed by many local authorities. However, discussing is not enough.

SAS are calling for clearer public signage on the beach that would protect the public’s health from polluted water during recreation for this bathing season.

Click here to see the “There is no such thing as too much information” report in full. (300k PDF).

If you require Acrobat reader to view the PDF files, click here.

For more information please contact Richard Hardy or Andy Cummins on Tel: 0845 4583001 or Mob: 07711 767548.

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