Pfizers miljö- och ansvarsblogg

Interesting environmental discussions in several fora

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I have had two very exciting days, full of interesting discussions om pharmaceuticals and the environment, in three very different fora. Yesterday morning I had an internal meeting at the Pfizer office in Silverdal in Sollentuna, Sweden, where I met Pfizer colleagues working with our off-patent product portfolio. We had good discussions on green pharmaceuticals:

- What it is

- How to evaluate greenness and how to “certify” it

- And what type of business opportunities there could be with a greener product portfolio

We of course entered in to really interesting discussions on green critiera and green economic incentives. For details on these matters please read my blog posts from e.g. Oct 3, Sept 28, and Sept 23. We also tried to put the “greener product portfolio discussions” in a broader perspective of other types of “added values” we can bring to society. For more details on these ideas read the blog post from e.g. Oct 4 and Aug 23. Please also read a detailed discussion on “4 steps to a sustanable use of pharmaceuticals” in the blog post from Feb 8.

4 steps to sustainability

After the internal meeting, I met with the expert group on Pharmaceuticals and the Environment, supporting the All Party Committee on Environmental Objectives (in Swedish “Miljömålsberedningen“). You can read about our work in my blog posts from e.g. Nov 14 and  Sept 19. It is really a privilege to sit down and have very open and honest discussions with representatives from pretty much every single stakeholder in the sector. Not surprisingly we had good and long discussions on several of the ideas on actions/objectives that were originally presented by the Swedish MPA in the Dec 16, 2009 report on “increased environmental requirements on pharmaceutical manufacturing” (find some of my comments to those ideas in my blog post from Dec 17, 2009):

- Inclusion of environmental requirements in GMP

- Inclusion of Environmental Risk Assessments into the market authorization process for pharmaceuticals

- Considerations of environmental aspects in the pricing and reimbursement system, i.e. green criteria and green economic incentives

And today, the discussions on these matters and others continued when LIF’s (LIF - the Swedish Research Based Pharmaceutical Industry Association) environmental committee met at the LIF Office in Stockholm. For me it was a special meeting, since I “transferred” from chairman of the committee to “administratively responsible” for the committee. The reason of course that I nowadays work part time at the LIF Office. And I like to take the opportunity here to say thanks for all support Matilda Holst have given me during the years in her role at the LIF Office when I have been working as the chairman, and to also welcome Gisela Holm from AstraZeneca as the new chairperson of the committee.

In addition to the already mentioned items up for discussion today at the committee meeting, we also had a good presentation made by Karl Lilja from IVL, the Swedish Environmental Research Institute, on the environmental classification of pharmaceutical substances scheme at Fass.se. IVL has been the reviewer of all company submissions of environmental classifications of pharmaceutical substances since the beginning of 2005, so they have built up a significant amount of knowledge, experience and data. Read more about the Swedish classification scheme at Fass.se and on LIF’s web site.

So many interesting discussions - it is really a privilege to be working with all these people in such an interesting field! I am really looking forward to 2012! Discussions will be more intense, and more interesting, than ever!

Sustainable Development and the Pharma Industry

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I have today, as I do roughly once a year, discussed sustainability programs in the pharmaceutical industry with students at The Ångström Laboratory, Uppsala University. Interesting and a lot of fun!

The Ångström Laboratory

My presentation is part of a course on Environmental Management Systems, so I tried to explain our sustainability programs from the system perspective. Starting out with a general background on why sustainability programs in general, and environmental programs specifically, are necessary. Going into several aspects (or potential problems) that those programs need to address. And then moving over to follow-up and corrections that may be needed to secure environmental improvements over time. The outline is quite similar to the presentations and discussions I regularly do at SLU (see for instance these two blog posts: From March 10, 2011 and from Feb 19, 2009.

To describe the great numbers of environmental aspects that needs to be assessed I used a series of slides where a full picture of aspects are built up step-by-step: From your own manufacturing facility, looking back into your suppy-chain, looking downstream following your products out on the market, and finally of course also adding the R&D-operations to give the full picture. Below you see all the slides condensed into one… Quite a busy slide I have to say…

We had good discussions, and especially during the last 15 minutes when the students were given the task of identifying potential environmental aspects on a made-up company called Juicy Drinks Inc. The students should, based on the knowledge they had recieved on environmental management systems (e.g. ISO 14001) perform an “initial environmental review”. So, which environmental aspects do you think Juicy Drinks Inc has to address?

Perhaps we could get some good interactivity going here. Please provide your suggestions…

COP-17 in Durban - just one week away…

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It is now just one week left before the UN climate change conference, COP-17, starts in Durban in South Africa. You probably remember the very lively discussions, and very high expectations, before the COP-15 meeting in Copenhagen 2009, and the not so intense discussions prior to and during the COP-16 meeting in Cancun. The level of discussions right now prior to the Durban meeting feels pretty much identical with the Cancun pre-meeting debate. Low expectations, and not very much of a debate at all in general public media. This surprises me to some degree. The threats to nature and human health from global warming is not smaller today than two years ago, most likely actually the opposite. More research has been published showing where we most likley are heading. And a lot of activities are ongoing in industry to manage energy and climate change issues. So why do we not see activities on the political level? Is it so simple that the financial problems around the world takes all focus from our political leaders?

Regardless of the outcome of COP-17 (and my expectations are extremely small), I am convinced that enterprises around the world will continue working with their energy and climate change agenda. It has become a very natural part of the environmental sustainability programs. And in several cases the programs are not only successful from an environental point of view but also from a financial point of view. Decreased energy consumption, changes of energy sources, and other activities very often make good business sense! I would be very surprised if that is not also true for society as such…

To get inspired, please read the IVL report on a Swedish low carbon scenario around year 2050. Please also read about Pfizer’s energy and climate change projects on our global webpage. Projects that have helped us to decrease our emissions of green house gases significantly since the beginning of 2000.

Green house gas emissions

MistraPharma Board Meeting in Umeå

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The Board of the MistraPharma project met at Umeå University today. Host for the meeting was Mats Tysklind, one of the project managers of MistraPharma. The Board meeting itself was fairly fast today. We were all of course very pleased that Mistra has granted an additional 4 years to the project, and the important decision items on the meeting was Program Plan, list of deliverables, and budget. Although those discussions of course were interesting they could not compete with the laboratory tour after lunch.

It was a real pleasure to follow Mats and his coworkers Jerker Fick and Richard Lindberg to the laboratories of the Environmental & Biogeochemistry group at the Chemistry Department, at KBC (Kemiskt-Biologiskt Centrum) at the university.

Richard in action

Richard demonstrated some developed methods to isolate pharmaceutical residues from waste water. Some of the critical activities for MistraPharma’s success that have been undertaken by Mats and his coworkers are the development of analytical methods allowing for testing of 120 APIs (Active Pharmaceutical Ingridients) in water samples and extracts. We were all impressed while listening to Richard and Jerker presenting their work. In the picture below you see Mats and Christina Rudén (MistraPharma’s program director) listening to Jerker’s explanations.

Jerker, Mats and Christina

Richard then took us in to the analytical laboratory where they have their LC (liquid chromatography)and MS (mass spectroscopy) equipment. It was fascinating to see the enormous efficiency increase in testing, going from the lab bench into full automation.

Richard proudly presents...

We then got an update of some of the most recent results from their work. Very interesting data I can promise. Looking forward to see the final publications!

Thanks to Mats, Jerker, and Richard for an interesting day at the research laboratory. It is just to seldom that I put my shoes in the laboratory nowadays…

Pharmaceuticals and Environment at Läkemedelskongressen

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I have today acted both as moderator and lecturer in a Pharmaceuticals and the Environment session at Läkemedelskongressen, arranged by the Swedish Academy of Pharmaceutical Sciences. It has definitely been an interesting day. It started with introductory remarks by Anders Blanck, managing director for LIF (the research based pharmaceutical industry in Sweden). Anders said something very thought worthy about good, safe and rational use of pharmaceuticals. Of course he stressed the importance of providing the correct medicine and dosage, at the right time, to the right patient, but he also stressed the importance of the price of the medicine, equal care and treatment, and not the least environmental impacts. This was of course a prefect introduction to today’s key note address from Joakim Larsson from Sahlgrenska Akademin, at University of Gothenborg.

Joakim Larsson

I have mentioned Joakim’s research several times here at the blog. See for instance the following blog posts: Aug 16 2010, Jan 20 2011, Feb 18 2011, and Jul 4 2011. Joakim gave as always a very interesting, and horryfying, description of the situation at the Patancheru waste water treatment plant outside Hyderabad, in India. He decribed the risks with releases of active pharmaceuticals ingridients to the environment, focusing on the risks for antimicrobial resistance development. He also stressed the importance of collaborations between all parties in order to manage the situation.

Several actors involved...

He finished the key note speech with a slide summarizing the challenges:

Some challenges

As a moderator for the break-out session focusing in more detail on pharmaceuticals and the environment I then gave a short summary on “what is going on” in EU and here in Sweden when it comes to pharmaceuticals in the environment, e.g.:

- EU Water Framework Directive, which may come to include specific pharmaceutical substances

- The EU Pharmas project

- The MistraPharma project

- The Swedish MPA proposal on inclusion of environmental requirements into GMP

- The All Party Committee on Environmental Objectives

- The National Pharmaceutical Strategy

- Sofia Wallström’s review

After the my introduction, Åke Wennmalm from SustainPharma (and previously environemntal director att Stockholm County Council) gave us some detailed insight in environmental risk assessments on pharmaceuticals substances. You can read more on this link to the classification scheme on fass.se.

Åke Wennmalm

Åke also added some of our latests thoughts upon environmental assessments of the whole products. This has been the topic for several discussions during the last 6 months (see blog posts from Sept 28, Sept 1, May 17, May 11, and March 28).

In order for the industry to provide “green products” it is of greatest importance to utilize a green chemistry toolbox. Eva Jacobsson from AstraZeneca helped us to realize the large opportunities in green chemistry when it comes to lower the environmental impacts from manufacturing operations.

Eva Jacobsson, AZ

Eva gave us very good insight in AstraZeneca’s work processes to greening the manufacturing processes, as early as possible during the development phase.

Green Chemistry at AZ

But she also discussed Green Drug Design, very interesting. However really difficult… Could we possibly be successful in desiging the substances perfectly from an environmental point of view from the beginning, e.g. easily degradable substances, with low toxicity and no potential for bioaccumulation?

Green Drug Design

We then expanded our scope of discussion by looking into another industrial sector - textile and clothing. As always it was a real pleasure to listen to Renée Andersson from Indiska.

Renee Andersson, Indiska

I have listened to Renée’s experiences from her work with Indiska’s supply chain several times before (see for instance my blog post from Aug 26, 2010) and it is my clear opinion that we as an industry have a lot to learn from Indiska and their peers. Which is not really surprising since they have been dealing with these issues, in very much detail, years before it came up high on our industry agenda.

It was then my turn to enter the stage as a lecturer. I tried both to summarize reflections from the previous speakers, and to look into the future. What are our challenges of tomorrow, and what will our agenda look like in the coming 10 years?

I am on stage...

My final, summarizing slide was this one, where I discuss several aspects of pharmaceuticals and the environment which I believe will be crucial for our future success.

A very interesting day, with good presentations and discussions!