New reports show that the English government may be misleading the public about the safety of rivers and streams. That is because more than half of the country’s sewage plant treatments “may be providing incorrect data on how often they dump untreated waste into rivers.”
So when you are told it’s safe to swim or fish in a river, that may not be true. The Times of London analyzed reports from “what are known as event duration monitors (EDMs).” They say that this often produces “false negative” results and misses when a sewage spill has happened. They estimate that the government may have missed up to 200 spills in 2021 alone. Yuck!