Pfizers miljö- och ansvarsblogg

So, the year 2011 has soon come to an end…

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These days, in the end of the year, it is almost impossible to open a magazine or a newspaper without finding a list of the most important things that happened in 2011. My own list would look something like this (if I take it from a strictly professional perspective). It is worth mentioning that I have not put the “happenings” in any ranking order, these are just some things that come to my mind sitting here in front of the computer.

- The National Pharmaceutical Strategy was published and it did highlight some important issues around Pharmaceuticals and the Environment (e.g. the so called action items number 7.1 to 7.4). One very important action item in the Strategy is number 7.1: Sofia Wallström’s review on environmental considerations within the frame of the pricing and reimbursement system.

- In parallell with the work to develop the Strategy, LIF run a series of round-table discussions (and break-out work group sessions) to develop ideas around green criteria and green economic incentives. These discussions will both be important for action item number 7.1 in the Strategy (see above) and for 7.2: “Encourage voluntary control of emissions from pharmaceutical factories” (see for instance this link for more information)

- As a consequence of the discussions around the National Pharmaceutical Strategy and Sustainability, a work-group within LIF, consisting of among others members from the Environmental Committee, developed a strategy called “4 steps to a sustainable use of pharmaceuticals“.

- I started working part-time at LIF (the Swedish Association of the Research Based Pharmaceutical Industry). It is fun, interesting and challeging - exactly as I want it! I will be the project leader for action item 7.2 in the National Pharmaceutical Strategy, and also develop a CSR strategy or program for LIF.

- LIF has, in collaboration with all relevant stakeholders in the sector, planned for a campaign to be run during spring 2012 on the importance to bring back, to any pharmacy of your choice, any un-used medicines. This is regradless of where you have purchased them. More to come on this item during 2012.

- The All Party Committee on Environmental Objectives was initiated. One of the first priorities is the objective “A Non-toxic Environment”. See the blog post from the initial meeting of the work-group on Pharmaceuticals and the Environment, which is a prioritized issue in the review of the “Non-toxic Environment-objective”.

- One of the most discussed items within the field of pharmaceuticals and the environment was MPA’s report on how GMP can be amended with environmental requirements. An item that will be high on the agenda for several years to come, that’s for sure.

- When it comes to Public Procurement the most important thing that happened during 2011 was that County Councils finally started to follow-up their criteria, and company answers, on environmental and social responsibility issues. See this link for some more details.

- MistraPharma got funding for an additional 4 year period. If you would like to meet one of MistraPharma’s project managers “face-to-face” please have a look on the TEDx lecture given by Joakim Larsson on pharmaceutical substance releases from manufacturing.

- The end of the Dizza Tobak project. After three extremely fun and interesting years our collaboration with among others SAMBA and A Non Smoking Generation the project has come to an end. It will be interesting to see how we manage to build on the experiences we have gained and on the lessons we have learned when it comes to working with youth advocacy leaders and social media.

- The EU communication on CSR was published (see the communication, and also some of my comments on CSR and corporations, e.g. “an enterprise 2020 company“, and how a CSR program in a company can be communicated to colleagues). I will for sure come back to this issue several times during 2012 in my work on developing a CSR strategy/program for LIF.

- The political summit in Almedalen was as always stimulating as well as very interesting. See some of my reflections to seminars and meetings via this link.

- We saw a good participation in Earth Hour 2011, but few political achievements during the large UN Climate Conference in Durban. Cannot really say that I believe any real breakthrough to happen here during 2012…

- I received the award “Women’s Heart of the Year” (in Swedish: Årets Kvinnohjärta) from the Sollentuna Kvinnojour. I have to admit that I am very proud!

- My blogpost number 400 was written… It has become quite a few blog posts during these years… I am actually kind of proud of this as well! It presents a good opportunity for interactive communication, although I have to say that I would still welcome much more comments!

If you would like to read a summary of year 2010 and the ideas and expectations I had for 2011 roughly a year ago follow this link. As you see, some things hang around several years…

The final phase of the Dizza Tobak project…

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We are now in the final weeks of the Dizza Tobak project…

The project was initiated three years ago. It has been a collaboration between, among others, Pfizer Foundation, Pfizer AB, SAMBA, A Non Smoking Generation, and American Cancer Society (ACS). The project is a tobacco prevention initiative, where teenagers are creating e.g. videos to share the message that “tobacco is NOT cool” through their social media channels and through other communication channels. Their contributions have been uploaded on the Dizza Tobak web site. Have a look - there are so many good pieces there! If you want more details on the project please read any of my many blog posts on Dizza Tobak. You’ll find them in the “Dizza Tobak Category Archive“. 

Anders Lönegård, the project manager from SAMBA, is right now finalizing “Dizza Tobak - the Book” and “Dizza Tobak - the Movie” where stories, experiences, lessons learned etc will be told. I promise to come back to the topic as soon as there are more stuff to share. It has been a very successful project, and it is definitely worth sharing!

Stockholm County Council’s new environmental program

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I read in yesterday’s Pharma Online newsletter that Stockholm County Council (SLL, Stockholms Läns Landsting), with their new Environmental Program 2012-2016, has sent a “challenge” to the Swedish government, other county councils and municipalities around Sweden.

Gustav Andersson, with a political responsability for environmental matters in Stockholm County Council, says in a press release that (nota bene: it is my own translation here):

“We will work faster, at a high speed, in several environmental areas with our tough objectives. Moreover, we challenge others!”

Pharmaceuticals is among the areas for environmental objectives. SLL says that they will continue their work to reduce the environmental impact from the usage of pharmaceuticals. A tool for this work is of course SLL’s own pamphlet of environmentally classified active pharmaceutical ingriedients, which is based on data from LIF’s classification scheme avalable through Fass.se. That makes good sense of course. But what frightens me is when they say that (once again my translation and words, not their)

“we will phase out all environmentally hazardous pharmaceuticals and chemicals”.

There are several life saving pharmaceuticals, which according to the classification scheme may very well be rated “environmentally hazardous”. To phase them out, e.g. products for chemotherapy, should not in my opinion be an objective for a county council. A wise use of the products, with safety precautions of course implemented, is to me a clear responsibility for a county council. Patients that need the therapy should of course have access to the treatment. I do not think actually that anyone in the County Council would argue here. It rather shows the problems of setting, and communicating, environmental objectives. Even if the use of “hazardous substances” has increased (which may be warranted due to an increase in patients with certain forms of cancer for instance) the County Council may have done a magnificent work within the environmental program.

The “right use” of pharmaceuticals - from the unique patient’s perspective and from a more holistic perspective on public health and environment - is not always a very simple discussion to take…

Nature and Environment Prize 2012

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I just realized that very soon (on Monday, Dec 12) is the last day to send in nominations to the Nature and Environment Prize 2012. It is a prize awarded by the Nordic Council, and it is intended for an individual, a company or an organization that have made great contribution to bio-diversity. Since bio-diversity is of great important to us all, and not least to the pharmaceutical industry and patients around the globe (several pharmaceutical substances come from nature), I of course like to draw your attention to this. If you know anyone who should be worth this - send in the nomination!

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!