Pharmaceutical pollution of the world's rivers

Abstract

Environmental exposure to active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) can have negative effects on the health of ecosystems and humans. While numerous studies have monitored APIs in rivers, these employ different analytical methods, measure different APIs, and have ignored many of the countries of the world. This makes it difficult to quantify the scale of the problem from a global perspective. Furthermore, comparison of the existing data, generated for different studies/regions/continents, is challenging due to the vast differences between the analytical methodologies employed. Here, we present a global-scale study of API pollution in 258 of the world's rivers, representing the environmental influence of 471.4 million people across 137 geographic regions. Samples were obtained from 1,052 locations in 104 countries (representing all continents and 36 countries not previously studied for API contamination) and analyzed for 61 APIs. Highest cumulative API concentrations were observed in sub-Saharan Africa, south Asia, and South America. The most contaminated sites were in low- to middle-income countries and were associated with areas with poor wastewater and waste management infrastructure and pharmaceutical manufacturing. The most frequently detected APIs were carbamazepine, metformin, and caffeine (a compound also arising from lifestyle use), which were detected at over half of the sites monitored. Concentrations of at least one API at 25.7% of the sampling sites were greater than concentrations considered safe for aquatic organisms, or which are of concern in terms of selection for antimicrobial resistance. Therefore, pharmaceutical pollution poses a global threat to environmental and human health, as well as to delivery of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

Metadata

Item Type:	Article
Authors/Creators:	Wilkinson, John L https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6993-216X Boxall, Alistair B A https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3823-7516 Kolpin, Dana W Leung, Kenneth M Y Lai, Racliffe W S Galbán-Malagón, Cristóbal Adell, Aiko D Mondon, Julie Metian, Marc Marchant, Robert A https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5013-4056 Bouzas-Monroy, Alejandra Cuni-Sanchez, Aida (acs587@york.ac.uk) Coors, Anja Carriquiriborde, Pedro Rojo, Macarena Gordon, Chris Cara, Magdalena Moermond, Monique Luarte, Thais Petrosyan, Vahagn Perikhanyan, Yekaterina Mahon, Clare S (csm543@york.ac.uk) McGurk, Christopher J Hofmann, Thilo Kormoker, Tapos Iniguez, Volga Guzman-Otazo, Jessica Tavares, Jean L Gildasio De Figueiredo, Francisco Razzolini, Maria T P Dougnon, Victorien Gbaguidi, Gildas Traoré, Oumar Blais, Jules M Kimpe, Linda E Wong, Michelle Wong, Donald Ntchantcho, Romaric Pizarro, Jaime Ying, Guang-Guo Chen, Chang-Er Páez, Martha Martínez-Lara, Jina Otamonga, Jean-Paul Poté, John Ifo, Suspense A Wilson, Penelope Echeverría-Sáenz, Silvia Udikovic-Kolic, Nikolina Milakovic, Milena Fatta-Kassinos, Despo Ioannou-Ttofa, Lida Belušová, Vladimíra Vymazal, Jan Cárdenas-Bustamante, María Kassa, Bayable A Garric, Jeanne Chaumot, Arnaud Gibba, Peter Kunchulia, Ilia Seidensticker, Sven Lyberatos, Gerasimos Halldórsson, Halldór P Melling, Molly Shashidhar, Thatikonda Lamba, Manisha Nastiti, Anindrya Supriatin, Adee Pourang, Nima Abedini, Ali Abdullah, Omar Gharbia, Salem S Pilla, Francesco Chefetz, Benny Topaz, Tom Yao, Koffi Marcellin Aubakirova, Bakhyt Beisenova, Raikhan Olaka, Lydia Mulu, Jemimah K Chatanga, Peter Ntuli, Victor Blama, Nathaniel T Sherif, Sheck Aris, Ahmad Zaharin Looi, Ley Juen Niang, Mahamoudane Traore, Seydou T Oldenkamp, Rik (or622@york.ac.uk) Ogunbanwo, Olatayo Ashfaq, Muhammad Iqbal, Muhammad Abdeen, Ziad O'Dea, Aaron Morales-Saldaña, Jorge Manuel Custodio, María de la Cruz, Heidi Navarrete, Ian Carvalho, Fabio Gogra, Alhaji Brima Koroma, Bashiru M Cerkvenik-Flajs, Vesna Gombač, Mitja Thwala, Melusi Choi, Kyungho Kang, Habyeong Ladu, John L Celestino Rico, Andreu Amerasinghe, Priyanie Sobek, Anna Horlitz, Gisela Zenker, Armin K King, Alex C Jiang, Jheng-Jie Kariuki, Rebecca https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7888-7594 Tumbo, Madaka Tezel, Ulas Onay, Turgut T Lejju, Julius B Vystavna, Yuliya Vergeles, Yuriy Heinzen, Horacio Pérez-Parada, Andrés Sims, Douglas B Figy, Maritza Good, David Teta, Charles
Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information:	© 2022 the Author(s)
Dates:	Accepted: 10 December 2021 Published: 22 February 2022
Institution:	The University of York
Academic Units:	The University of York > Faculty of Sciences (York) > Environment and Geography (York) The University of York > Faculty of Sciences (York) > Chemistry (York)
Depositing User:	Pure (York)
Date Deposited:	16 Feb 2022 11:50
Last Modified:	17 Apr 2024 23:16
Published Version:	https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2113947119
Status:	Published
Refereed:	Yes
Identification Number:	https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2113947119

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Pharmaceutical pollution of the world's rivers

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