Pollution from Personal Actions and Activities-Pharmaceuticals and Personal Care Products (PPCPs)

vvEPA Science Forum

Partnering to ProtectHutiiati Health and the Etirironmerit

Year of Water:

Thirty Years

Through Partnering

Christian G. Daughton, Ph.D.

U.S. EPA, Office of Research and Development,
National Exposure Research Laboratory,
Environmental Sciences Division, Las Vegas

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Regulated pollutants represent but a small
portion of the total numbers of manmade
and naturally occurring pollutants to which
humans are continually exposed.

Our limited understanding of the universe
of chemical exposure is partly a result of the
limitations of analytical chemistry.

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NATIVE | ^

ICOMPOUNDS larg

large portion of naturally occurring
' anthropogenic

tICs = tentatively identifie

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Office of Research and Development
National Exposure Research Laboratory
Environmental Sciences Division
Environmental Chemistry Branch

Biological Systems and Stressors
"Toxicant Totality Tolerance Trajectory" - 4T's

Christian G. Daughton, Ph.D.

October 2002
fw.Bpa.gov/nerlesd1/chBmistry/pharmaiindex.ht

Origins and Fate of PPCPs? in the Environment

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Office of Research and Development
National Exposure Research Laboratory
Environmental Sciences Division
Environmental Chemistry Branch

Countless previously
unrecognized pollutants
are often present in waters.
These ubiquitous "micro-
contaminants" occur at
minute concentrations of
parts-per-billion (ng/L) and
below.

Toxicology has yet to reveal
the human or environmental
health significance of long-
term, simultaneous exposure
to multitudes of chemical
stressors

(subtle effects such as behavioral
changes are the primary concern).

http://www.epa.gov/nerlesd1/chemistry/ppcp/stressors.htm

• Release to private septic/leach fields

¦ Treated effluent from domestic sewage trea

into aquifers (recharge)

• Overflow of untreated sewage from storm «

0 • Transfer of sewage solids ("biosolids") to la

• "Straight-piping" from homes (untreated se'

• Release from agriculture: spray drift from t

¦ Dung from medicated domestic animals (e.j

nent plants discharged to surface waters or re-injected

'ents and system failures directly to surface waters

A (e.g., soil amendment/fertilization)
age discharged directly to smface waters)
je crops (e.g., antibiotics)

, feed) - CAFOs (confined animal feeding operations)

0 • Release of drags that serve double duty as pest control agents:

examples: 4-aminopyridine, experimental multiple sclerosis thug -~<
warfarin, anticoagulant -*¦ rat poison; azacholesterol, antilipidemics -

analges:

; caffein

Tog con

HI • Discharge of regulated/controlled industrial manufacturing waste sti
* Disposal/release from clandestine drug labs and illicit drug usage

Hoi Ultimate environmental fate:

• most PPCPs eventually transported from terrestrial domain to aqueous i

• phototransfonnation (both direct and indirect reactions via UV light)
•physioochemical alteration, degradation, and ultimate mineralization
•volatilization (mainly certain anesthetics, fragrances)

http://www.epa.gov/nerlesd1/chemistry/pharma/images/drawing.pdf

~ Pharmaceuticals and personal care products (PPCPs) comprise a diverse galaxy of
micro-pollutants that gain entry to the environment byway of their usage in human and
veterinary medicine as well as agriculture. PPCPs and metabolites are excreted and washed
into sewage and waterways. Expired/unwanted medications are also directly disposed to
toilets and trash.

~ Pollution of water by PPCPs and many other previously unrecognized chemicals results
primarily from the individually minuscule but significant combined impacts from
consumerism.

~ Sewage and drinking water treatment facilities are often not effective at removing PPCPs
and other unregulated pollutants.

'. Ep!i iEff&plirflh PPCPs

~ The PPCPs Web Site is the Agency's major resource for researchers and
laity worldwide.

~ Seminal publications have helped to lay the foundation for current and
future research and regulatory attention in the U.S. for "emerging"
contaminants.

~ Pioneering efforts for a Green Pharmacy is fostering attention to the need
for consumer-level environmental stewardship programs for PPCPs
(pollution prevention).

~ More attention is being devoted to the use of
PPCPs as "tracers" or "markers" — tools for rapidly
detecting trace levels of sewage contamination of
waters (a major issue especially with regard to
septic systems, "straight-piping," and POTW
overflow events).

~ Schools are using PPCPs WebSite materials to
teach principles of environmental science and
proper use of the literature ("literature forensics").

The
Green
Pharmacy

http://www.epa.gov/nerlesd1/chemistry/ppcp/greenpharmacy.htm

Don't Let YOUR Drugs Get Away

~ Prudent 8 Minimal Usage

~ Recyling of Unwanted PPGPs

http://www.epa.gov/nerlesd1/chemistry/pharma/critical.htm

~on

EPA's research role beginning in
the late 7 990s is largely
promulgated from its design and
maintenance of the world's only
web site devoted to the many
scientific and social aspects of
PPCPs as pollutants.

http://www.epa.gov/nerlesd1/chemistry/pharma/

This work is complemented by:

Publishing seminal articles in the peer-reviewed literature on the state of
the science and future research needs.

Championing the need for environmental stewardship programs
(pollution prevention) to minimize the introduction of PPCPs to the
environment - The Green Pharmacy.

Presenting invited lectures at numerous international, national, regional,
and academic scientific conferences and seminars.

~ Catalyzing research worldwide by delineating research needs, promulgating
funding opportunities, and fostering collaborations.

~ Maintaining an in-house research program for improving the scope and sensitivity
of chemical analysis approaches for problematic unregulated pollutants (including
PPCPs).

~ Devoting significant time to public outreach activities and education of the press.

~ Form interagency workgroup to address wide array of research needs regarding
PPCPs as pollutants and for making progress toward a Green Pharmacy: EPA,
FDA, USGS,CDC, USDA, DEA, USFWS, NAS-IOM, health care industry.

~ Develop consistent nationwide guidance for disposal of unwanted PPCPs: collaboration among
EPA's OSW,OPPT, Regions,and ORD.

~ Innovate more effective approaches to risk
communication, especially for groundwater recharge
and water reuse.

~ Design and implement a nationwide, universal early
warning water monitoring system for "emerging"
chemical pollutants (would serve double duty for
Homeland Security).

~ Develop holistic "systems-level" approaches for
toxicological assessment more amenable to the subtle
effects that come into play with ecological communities.

http://www.epa.gov/nerlesd1 /chemistry/pharma/science-issues.htm#OneProposal

Communicating Risk
More Effectively

Rapidly growing importance of public acceptance of
wastewater reuse for human consumption (especially so-
called "toilet-to-tap" reuse programs) highlights the need
for vastly improved approaches to risk communication.

> Points to need for scientists to better convey the significance of their
work to the public.

y Points to need for exploring more effecti ve means for aligning, the
long-troubling disconnect of disparate views of risks as held by scientists
versus the public: real hazard vs. risk perception.

> Receiving little attention is the mote substantive role thai could be
played by the cognitive.sciences (social scientists and psychologists) ii
helping to bridge the widening risk communications gap.

Partnering to Protect Human 'Health unci the Environment

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