As temperatures heat up across the United States this week, a new report found that many American coastal waterways and beaches are contaminated with unsafe levels of fecal bacteria.
About half of U.S. beaches were discovered to contain potentially unsafe levels of the bacteria in 2022, according to a recent annual Safe for Swimming report about the state of American beaches. The report was commissioned by the research group Environment America, a federation of state-based environmental advocacy organizations founded in 2007.
“In 2022, 1,761 out of 3,192 tested beaches nationwide (55 percent) experienced at least one day on which fecal contamination reached potentially unsafe levels—that is, exceeding EPA’s most protective ‘Beach Action Value,’ a conservative, precautionary tool states can use to make beach notification decisions,” the Safe for Swimming report, released this week, stated. “Beaches may also have experienced contamination on days when testing did not take place.”…