I'm not sure how I got into this discussion but since I make composting toilets for a living I've done quite a bit of research on this....
You are correct urine is sterile and will lose sterility quickly when dumped into a nonsterile body of water. However, so will the contents of a can of vacuum packed (sterile) soup when dumped into the water. Which means that one is no more likely to "catch something" from the expelled soup than the urine. The issue in dumping urine is not in causing disease but in that one is adding nutrients to a system that is most likely overloaded with them aleady. Too many nutrients causes unbalance in the local ecosystem and has the ultimate and general effect of reducing the amount of animal diversity. It makes all the sense in the world to empty small amounts of urine and feces into areas that will not feel the effects...open ocean at least a few miles out (where legal). Hope that helps, Geoffrey Trott General Manager Eos Design LLC PO Box 5 Mt. Vernon, OH 43050 740-392-3642 --- [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: From: "Lew Hodgett" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[email protected]> Cc: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Re: [Liveaboard] Wilcox Skipper Head Info Date: Wed, 04 Jun 2008 15:19:39 -0700 "Philip R. McGovern" wrote: > > I know nothing about this, but a cruising nurse from Minnesota > recently told > me that urine *is* sterile. When first discharged, urine is sterile; however, it's contents provide and excellent place to nurture unwanted things and it loses sterile status in short order. Lew _______________________________________________ Liveaboard mailing list [email protected] To adjust your membership settings over the web http://www.liveaboardnow.org/mailman/listinfo/liveaboard To subscribe send an email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] To unsubscribe send an email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] The archives are at http://www.liveaboardnow.org/pipermail/liveaboard/ To search the archives http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected] The Mailman Users Guide can be found here http://www.gnu.org/software/mailman/mailman-member/index.html
