Professor Kümmerer on green pharmacy in Nature Sustainability
2024-06-13 Lüneburg/London. A commentary on the urgent need to develop more environmentally friendly medicines has now been published in the internationally renowned journal Nature Sustainability. The authors of the article are 17 scientists from seven nations, including the expert for sustainable chemistry and material resources, Professor Dr. Klaus Kümmerer from Leuphana University Lüneburg.
The authors see the ubiquitous contamination of ecosystems with active pharmaceutical ingredients as a serious threat to biodiversity, ecosystem services and public health. They therefore urgently call for the development of more environmentally friendly pharmaceuticals that maintain their efficacy while minimizing their environmental impact.
The environmental impact of the manufacture, use and disposal of pharmaceuticals has resulted in ecosystems around the world being contaminated with mixtures of active pharmaceutical ingredients and their metabolites, additives, excipients, adjuvants and transformation products. The extent of active ingredient pollution was recently demonstrated in a large-scale geographical study.
You can read the full article here:
doi.org/10.1038/s41893-024-01374-y
About the person
Kümmerer's work on green and sustainable pharmacy and sustainable chemistry and his "benign-by-design" approach are pioneering worldwide and have contributed significantly to a new perspective on the role of pharmacy and chemistry in a circular and sustainable economy. His long-term strategies for removing micropollutants from the aquatic cycle and for the sustainable use of resources as a whole have an impact in many areas of science, but also in industry, water management, environmental administration and politics.
Further information can be found at
www.leuphana.de/klaus-kuemmerer.html