title: Increased acute toxicity to fish caused by pharmaceuticals in hospital effluents in a pharmaceutical mixture and after solar irradiation.
abstract: Hospital effluents are an important source of residual drugs and other classes of pharmaceuticals in aquatic environments. The raw wastewater from the studied hospital exhibited acute toxicity to vertebrate organisms, and Cyprinus carpio was the most sensitive organism tested. A mixture of 19 commonly used pharmaceuticals caused acute toxicity to C. carpio with an LC50 value of 60.68mgL(-1) after 96h. This study demonstrated that irradiation for 1-5days significantly increased the acute toxicity of the pharmaceuticals to fish, leading to increased mortality after a 2-h exposure and approximately 40% of the surviving fish died within 28days. The pre-irradiated pharmaceutical mixture also induced strange behaviors in the fish that survived the test. The synergistic increase in toxicity caused by the photolysis and mixing of pharmaceuticals cannot be ignored and warrants further examination.
authors.affiliation: Graduate Institute of Environmental Engineering, National Taiwan University, 71, Chou-Shan Rd., Taipei 106, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Shih-Wei
authors.initials: SW
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: Graduate Institute of Environmental Engineering, National Taiwan University, 71, Chou-Shan Rd., Taipei 106, Taiwan. Electronic address: yuchenlin@ntu.edu.tw.
authors.forename: Angela Yu-Chen
authors.initials: AY
authors.lastname: Lin
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D002347:Carps; D064420:Drug-Related Side Effects and Adverse Reactions; D006761:Hospitals; D007928:Lethal Dose 50; D004364:Pharmaceutical Preparations / Q000528:radiation effects*; D010782:Photolysis; D013472:Sunlight; D062065:Wastewater; D014874:Water Pollutants, Chemical / Q000528:radiation effects* / Q000633:toxicity*
chemical_list: D004364:Pharmaceutical Preparations; D062065:Wastewater; D014874:Water Pollutants, Chemical
keywords: Acute toxicity; Hospital effluents; Pharmaceutical mixture; Solar irradiation; Synergistic