Aquatic pollution from antibiotics production sites - evaluation of occurrences in wastewater, runoff and water bodies

Antibiotic resistance is increasingly jeopardising the effectiveness of prevention and medical treatment of an increasing number of infectious diseases and is causing a high number of premature deaths worldwide. By now, it is widely recognised that the release of antibiotics into the environment via production wastewater discharged from the pharmaceutical industry constitutes an important factor. Evidently, tackling such point sources through appropriate treatment of production wastewater would be a decisive step towards achieving a substantial reduction in antibiotic pollution and consequently in a reduction of occurrences of resistant pathogens. The here presented pilot study addresses the overall feasibility of implementing maximum permitted API concentrations in production wastewater and how to verify compliance. Wastewater from 19 production sites from Europe, India and China has been investigated. The sites selected previously agreed to comply with the PNEC values for certain antibiotics in their wastewater and to permit independent inspections. In addition, wherever possible, supplementary environmental investigations were conducted in water bodies adjacent to the production sites.

So far, > 27 different antibiotics have been detected, some of them repeatedly and at several sampling locations. Antibiotic concentrations exceeding PNEC limits were found at ten production sites - both in wastewater samples and in affected environmental samples. Maximum environmental concentrations ranged from 0.1 µg/l up to 18.5 mg/l, wastewater concentrations from 0.1 µg/L to 22.5 µg/L. In the total number of environmental water samples analysed, more than 60 % of antibiotic concentrations exceeded the ecotoxicological PNEC value, whereas no reliable, scientifically derived effect threshold was available for other antibiotics in these samples.

The results of our study confirm and quantify that wastewater from pharmaceutical production sites, as well as surface runoff and thus the general handling of active substances at these sites, contribute significantly to high concentrations of antibiotics in the environment and thus to the potential emergence of antibiotic resistance. Moreover, in view of the current intention to regulate the emissions of antimicrobial substances via the environmental risk assessment for human pharmaceuticals, it should be borne in mind that an effective system for verifying the values or explanations provided by the companies is required.