Mining chemical information in Swedish wastewaters for simultaneous assessment of population consumption, treatment efficiency and environmental discharge of illicit drugs

Abstract

Consumption of illicit drugs poses health risks to the public and environment. Knowledge on their usage helps better implementations of intervention strategies to reduce drug-related harms in the society and also policies to limit their releases as emerging contaminants to recipient environments. This study aimed to investigate from the daily consumption to treatment efficiency and subsequent discharge of illicit drugs by the Swedish urban populations based on simultaneous collection and analysis of influent and effluent wastewater. Two different weekly monitoring campaigns showed similar drug prevalence in Stockholm and Uppsala, with amphetamine as the most popular drug. Almost all target drug residues were still measurable in effluent wastewater. High removal efficiencies (>94%) were observed for amphetamine, cocaine and benzoylecgonine, whereas ketamine, 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA), mephedrone and methamphetamine were the least removed substances (

Published in

Scientific Reports
2021, volume: 11, number: 1, article number: 13510

SLU Authors

• Haalck, Inga

  • Department of Aquatic Sciences and Assessment, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

• Löffler, Paul

  • Department of Aquatic Sciences and Assessment, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

• Baduel, Christine

  • Department of Aquatic Sciences and Assessment, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    
  • Universite Grenoble Alpes (UGA)

• Wiberg, Karin

  • Department of Aquatic Sciences and Assessment, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

• Ahrens, Lutz

  • Department of Aquatic Sciences and Assessment, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

• Lai, Foon Yin

  • Department of Aquatic Sciences and Assessment, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

Global goals (SDG)

SDG3 Good health and well-being

UKÄ Subject classification

Oceanography, Hydrology, Water Resources

Publication identifier

• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-92915-4

Permanent link to this page (URI)

https://res.slu.se/id/publ/112893