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On a warm Sunday in July I went for a walk on the beach north of Thorpeness. I walked just one hundred metres and this is what I found: seventy pieces of  'sewage related debris'.... 

Sanitary towels (and other plastic items, such as tampon applicators and cotton bud sticks), when flushed down the loo, can get pass through our sewage treatment works after heavy rain and be discharged out to sea through CSOs (combined sewage overflows). There are no CSOs at Thorpeness and, at the time of this walk, we had been suffering a drought here for weeks. Depressingly, this debris can be found in varying quanitities whenever I visit our beaches, at all times of year and regardless of rainfall, indicating the presence of huge quantities here in the North Sea and elsewhere.

Please support Surfers against Sewage and lobby your local water companies for investment in sewage treatment plants that are up to the job. But there is something we can all do to reduce this problem now:

PLEASE NEVER EVER FLUSH ANY KIND OF PLASTICS OR SANITARY WASTE DOWN THE LOO!

See also TOUCHING LIVES,IMPROVING LIFE? and SEEING THINGS