Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff production of I Heart Radio. Hey
Speaker 1: brain Stuff, Lauren boge ol bamb Here. With summer fast
Speaker 1: approaching here in the United States, we need to talk
Speaker 1: about swimming pools and the dirty secret of swimmers peeing
Speaker 1: in the pool. It's not just gross, according to the
Speaker 1: American Chemical Society, it's bad for our health. Research has
Speaker 1: shown that there are about thirty to eighty million liters
Speaker 1: of urine per person in public pools. That's about one
Speaker 1: to three ounces, or about a shot glassful per person.
Speaker 1: To counteract the urine and other stuff that winds up
Speaker 1: in the water like sweat, saliva, dirt, and traces of
Speaker 1: fecal matter, we add chemical disinfectants to keep pools clear
Speaker 1: and clean and to keep us from picking up bugs
Speaker 1: like salmonella and equally, and those disinfectants are doing their job,
Speaker 1: but unfortunately that's not all they're doing. Those disinfectants can
Speaker 1: react with urine, sweat, hair and body care products, and
Speaker 1: other organic matter that winds up in pools and create
Speaker 1: what researchers call dis infection by products or DBPs. These
Speaker 1: byproducts can cause serious health concerns, especially for professional swimmers
Speaker 1: and people who work around pools. Chronic inhalation of DBPs
Speaker 1: can cause respiratory problems such as asthma and are the
Speaker 1: main reason for the red burning eyes you may experience
Speaker 1: in the pool. And the number one culprit is you
Speaker 1: guessed it, urine, which causes half of the dvps found
Speaker 1: in pools and the air around them. Urine contains uria,
Speaker 1: a chemical that reacts with chlorine to form trichloramine, the
Speaker 1: compound that makes a pool smell like a pool. You'll
Speaker 1: never enjoy that smell again. It's also the one to
Speaker 1: blame for eyeburn and respiratory issues, a real problem for
Speaker 1: competitive swimmers who spend so much time in the water.
Speaker 1: But cutting down on DBPs is tough, since urinating in
Speaker 1: the pool is something almost everyone does. It's just easier
Speaker 1: than getting out to take a leak, and people mistakenly
Speaker 1: think the chlorine will just take care of it. Even
Speaker 1: Olympic swimmers like Michael Phelps and Ryan Locktey joke about
Speaker 1: their pool peeing. Ernest Blatchley, and environmental engineer Purdue University,
Speaker 1: said in an article in Chemical and Engineering News, high
Speaker 1: profile swimmers have a real opportunity to take a position
Speaker 1: of leadership and responsibility. The best thing that swimmers could
Speaker 1: do to improve the swimming environment for themselves and for
Speaker 1: everybody else who uses the pool is to practice common
Speaker 1: sense hygiene. That means first, taking a shower before getting
Speaker 1: into the pool to rinse off much of the dirt, sweat,
Speaker 1: and lotion our bodies carry around. And second, but most important,
Speaker 1: don't p in the pool. But what about the ocean?
Speaker 1: Phish p there, so why not humans? Right? Well, you're
Speaker 1: in luck. It's absolutely a okay to swim and p
Speaker 1: with the fishes. Today's episode was written by Karen Kirkpatrick
Speaker 1: and produced by Tyler Clang. The brain Stuff is a
Speaker 1: production of iHeart Radio's How Stuff Works. For more on
Speaker 1: this and lots of other sort of gross but important topics,
Speaker 1: visit our home planet how stuff Works dot com. And
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Speaker 1: favorite shows.