考虑到水中有数百种天然和人造的化学物质 世界各地都可能受到污染，这是维持健康水源的一个关键问题 未来的供应是确定“安全”暴露水平。监管指南 为保护健康和福利而设计的法律一直是政府的基础。 确定安全暴露水平的依据。例如，对于非致癌或全身性 影响，美国环境保护局制定参考剂量，加利福尼亚州制定公共剂量 健康目标。作为制定监管指南过程的一部分，各机构通常 纳入关于潜在健康影响或暴露的科学信息。 然而，每个机构也应用了可能产生意外后果的政策组件 削弱指南科学有效性和透明度的影响。 这篇论文 概述了当前用于确定“安全”饮用水水位的方法，并提供了 结合当前科学的替代品，以产生“安全”水平，并改善 确定性、透明度和再现性仍然是健康保护的。例如， 介绍了一种评价饮用水中药剂的方法。仅包含摘要。

Given hundreds of natural and human-made chemical agents in water to which people around the world could be exposed, a critical issue for maintaining healthful water supplies for the future is to determine "safe" exposure levels. Regulatory guidelines designed by law to protect health and welfare have been the governmental foundation and basis for establishing safe exposure levels. For example, for noncarcinogenic or systemic effects, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency develops reference doses and the State of California develops Public Health Goals. As part of the process of setting regulatory guidelines, agencies generally incorporate scientific information about the potential for health effects or exposure. However, each agency also applies policy components that can have the unintended effect of weakening the guideline's scientific validity and transparency. This paper outlines current methods used to establish "safe" drinking water levels, and offers alternatives that incorporate current science to yield "safe" levels with improved certainty, transparency and reproducibility yet are still health protective. As an example, a method of assessing pharmaceutical agents in drinking water is presented. Includes abstract only.