Why are cyanotoxins a potential problem water-users and consumers?
Cyanotoxins are now well-established as presenting hazards to health. They can present problems for water-used and consumers because: (a) they can be formed in high resource waterbodies which are used drinking water, recreation, aquaculture and irrigation; (b) they present risks to health at environmentally-occurring concentrations in waterbodies used for recreation, including bathing, and in water intended for drinking and specialist purposes (e.g. haemodialysis), unless adequately treated before use; (c) they can be retained within the cells which produced them, but also be released in soluble form into the surrounding water; (by persisting after cyanobacterial cell breakdown or removal, they can therefore be present in the absence of cyanobacterial cells); (d) they can be taken up at sublethal concentrations by aquatic animals and fish and be transferred along food chains. For more information please look on FAQs website links.
