Medicine in water
Human and veterinary medicines end up in the environment in different ways, but mainly during use. These biologically active substances have undesirable effects on aquatic and soil organisms. They have a major impact on soil processes and ecosystems. Due to increased monitoring, an increasing number of medicines have been found in recent years in concentrations ranging from μg/l to ng/l.
Currently however, little or no consideration is given to environmental impact in the authorisation procedures of pharmaceuticals. A lot still needs to be done in the research and legislation of human and veterinary medicines. Chemical analyses are an essential part of this and will play a more prominent role in future monitoring programmes.
We have an analysis package for the most frequently occurring medicines found in water. By using modern techniques these can be traced with a reporting threshold of 0.01 μg/l.
