Pharmaceuticals (Week 11) Flashcards
What is API
Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients. More than 3,000 are being administered worldwide in prescription medicines.
What are micropollutants
Usually not removed after water treatment
Environmental effects for many not well understood
Pharmaceuticals, hormones, pesticides, metals, naoplastics
What are macropollutants
water treatment technologies relatively effective at removal
Impacts on environment well known
Organic pollutants, nutrients, acid pollutants, microplastics
What are EPPPs
Environmentally Persistent Pharmaceuticals Pollutants
What are some pathways of pharmaceuticals to the environment
Manufacturing facility discharge
Improper disposal of medicines
Consumer excretion to waste water
Antibiotic use in food production (streptomycins in fruit growth & beekeeping)
Animal husbandry
What is male transform into female referred to as
Protandrous
What is female transform into male referred to as
Protogynous
What caused intersex in fish
Active chemicals in waters - No single hemical found but synthetic and natural estrogens and estrogen mimics found in detergents, pill, plastic residue present in sewage waste.
Does water pollution cause sterility in humans?
Exposure to endocrine disrupting chemicals in the environment is suspected, but no clear link established.
(Anti-androgens & estrogens)
Why is there cause for concern with pharmaceuticals
Are biologically active
Are excreted in unchanged active forms or as metabolites
Small amounts continuously entering water bodies
Many incompletely removed after water treatment, have potential to breakdown into numerous transformation products in the environment
Some are endocrine disrupting chems
Potential to bioaccumulate
Potential to enhance antimicrobial resistance
What are the short, medium and long term actions of tackling pharmaceutical pollution.
Technical approach, Education & Training, Benign compounds
What is the 1st stage of waste water treatment
Primary Treatment
Removal of heavy sollids
Chemical & Physical
What is the 2nd stage of waste water treatment
Secondary Treatment
Removal of organic matter
Biological
What is the 3rd stage of waste water treatment
Tertiary Treatment
Removal of pathogens& nutrients
Chemical, Physical & Biological
What is BOD
Biological Oxygen Demand
Amount of DO required by aerobic organisms to break down organic materials
