Pharmaceutical products in the environment:
Development and employment of novel methods for assessing their origin, fate and effects on human fecundity

Project Budget 2,593,000 Euros

In recent years there has been a growing interest in the significance of reported declines in human fecundity. It has been shown that the potential exists that exposure to environmental chemicals has an influence on human reproductive enpoints. However, it is still unknown to what extent food, acting as a "vector" of synthetic endocrine disrupters, affects fecundity.

So far, pharmaceutical products (PPs) have received little attention. Subsequently, little is known of the occurrence, fate and effects of PPs in the environment and their effects on human fecundity. This is partly due to the scarcity of simple and efficient methods for cleaning up and concentrating PPs from environmental and food samples. Moreover, there is a lack of diagnostic assays that can handle large numbers of samples rapidly and inexpensively.

The main objectives of the project are:

• Identify pharmaceutical products (PPs) which might affect human fecundity.
• Identify the mechanism(s) involved in their fecundity disrupting activity.
• Develop diagnostic methods and high throughput screening assays (HTSAs) for monitoring PPs.
• Evaluate environmental, food and population exposure to high risk PPs.
• Assess possible links between food and fecundity.
• Establish strategies for risk management.
• Disseminate the knowledge.

The Consortium