How the EU plans to charge drugmakers for cleaner water

Pharmaceutical companies face a new contribution to the cost of cleaning Europe’s wastewater under rules that extend their responsibility for medicines beyond their use by patients. The funding system is already written into EU law, although its design, likely cost and effect on medicine supplies remain contested.

The revised Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive requires pharmaceutical and cosmetics producers to fund most of the additional treatment needed to remove chemical residues. Governments are preparing implementation while drugmakers challenge how responsibility has been assigned and whether the financial consequences have been properly assessed.