In photos, it looks like an exposed landfill. In reality, it is the Three Gorges Dam Reservoir so choked with floating trash it is impassible to smaller boats. 

To maintain an open passage and protect the river's already sorely damaged ecosystem, an emergency clean-up crew was dispatched along the banks of the reservoir. However, the flotilla of waste is a clear sign that despite fervent ecological proclamations from Beijing, local Chinese along the Yangtze River still regard the waterway as a municipal dump site. 

Like Us on Facebook

More worrying is what is going into the river. Aside from shoes, milk bottles, and wood from construction, medications have been found floating in the water. Even low chemical exposure to pharmaceuticals can adversely effect wildlife. Chronic exposure to endocrine disruptors, such as the compounds used in birth control, can feminize male fish and debilitate their capacity to reproduce.

More ominous, bacteria in the water already harmful to humans can develop resistance to antiobiotics diffused in the river, making infections more potent and difficult to cure. 

According to the World Wildlife Fund, "over the last 50 years, there has been a 73% increase in pollution levels from hundreds of cities, in the main stem of the Yangtze River. The annual discharge of sewage and industrial waste in the river has reached about 25 billion tons, which is 42% of the country's total sewage discharge, and 45% of its total industrial discharge."

The result is that in many places the river that used to be so clear it was said you could drop a stone and watch it sink all the way to the bottom is now poisonous. Several of the river's species, including the icon baiji, or Yangtze River Dolphin, have gone extinct.  

The largest of the trash-flotillas amassed in Zigui County in Hubei Province. 

TagsYangtze River, Pollution, trash, baiji