These common medications could be releasing ‘forever chemicals’ into the environment

By Amudalat Ajasa | The Washington Post | January 6, 2025

Read the full article by Amudalat Ajasa (The Washington Post)

"The widespread use of pharmaceuticals in America is introducing even more toxic “forever chemicals” into the environment through wastewater, according to a study released Monday, and large municipal wastewater treatment plants are not capable of fully filtering them out.

The plants’ inability to remove compounds known as organofluorines from wastewater before it enters drinking water supplies becomes even more pronounced during droughts and could affect up to 23 million people, scientists wrote in an article published Monday in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Most of the compounds came from commonly prescribed medications including antidepressants and statins, the researchers found.

They found that the organofluorines — a group that includes per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS — were found in wastewater in eight large municipal treatment plants. The wastewater continued to contain high concentration of organofluorines and other compounds that meet the definition of PFAS even after treatment."