Summary

• Centrient Pharmaceuticals reached a significant milestone in the clean production of its antibiotics, with the lowest environmental impact and minimizing the potential contribution to antimicrobial resistance
• The company is the first to publicly announce that Its entire supply chain of oral antibiotics – including its own and supplier manufacturing sites - is fully compliant with the stringent Predicted No Effect Concentration (PNEC) discharge targets set by the AMR Industry Alliance
• This achievement demonstrates Centrient Pharmaceuticals’ commitment and leadership in the responsible production of antibiotics.

Centrient Pharmaceuticals announces 100% compliance with the stringent Predicted No Effect Concentration (PNEC) discharge targets set by the AMR Industry Alliance for clean manufacturing of its full oral antibiotics product range. This standard covers both Centrient’s sites and its suppliers’ sites. This achievement positions the company as a frontrunner in the industry with the delivery of responsibly-produced antibiotics, which minimize the possible contribution to antimicrobial resistance.

The PNEC discharge target is the concentration of an antibiotic in water at which there is unlikely to be a risk of adverse environmental effects or of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) developing. These scientific, risk-based targets were developed by the AMR Industry Alliance and cover around 120 active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) used in antibiotic manufacturing. Each individual antibiotic has a corresponding PNEC value, published in the AMR Industry Alliance table of Recommended PNECs for Risk Assessments (updated periodically).

High concentrations of antibiotic residues in factory wastewater can create hotspots of resistant bacteria which may lead to AMR. While manufacturing is just one of the contributors to the emergence of AMR in the environment, its impact cannot be overlooked. AMR is a major threat to global public health as well as to the healthcare industry. Many standard medical procedures such as organ transplants, chemotherapy, and surgeries such as caesarean sections become much more dangerous without effective antibiotics to prevent and treat infections. Antibiotics are the cornerstone of our modern healthcare system, and complying with PNEC standards enables manufacturers to ensure supply of these critically important medicines does not contribute to the risk of AMR.

The PNEC values are increasingly being recognized as the standard for antibiotic discharge concentrations in water and are expanding beyond Alliance companies and their supply chains. For example, tenders in the UK and Germany (health insurer AOK) include a specific reference to the PNEC discharge targets. Also, companies assessed externally by organizations such as the Access to Medicine Foundation will have public exposure for their performance on PNECs.

As a strong advocate for sustainable manufacturing, Centrient Pharmaceuticals became a founding board member of the AMR Industry Alliance in 2017, working with partners to raise awareness and deliver solutions to the AMR issue. Since then, the company’s own journey to reaching full compliance has included establishing state-of-the-art wastewater treatment facilities at all their sites worldwide and developing tests for measuring antibiotic activity in wastewater streams, leading to a fully clean and PNEC-compliant supply chain.

“We are proud to be the first in our industry to publicly announce PNEC compliance for our oral antibiotics product supply chain.

At Centrient Pharmaceuticals, our commitment to Sustainability is in our DNA – we ensure that the way in which we produce pharmaceuticals has the lowest environmental impact and does not contribute to AMR. We are proud of our PureActives® enzymatic low-carbon technology, ISO 14001 certification of all our sites, and Board positions at the Pharmaceutical Supply Chain Initiative and AMR Industry Alliance.

We will continue to work with customers, suppliers, industry and government decision-makers across the value chain to make the supply and buying of antibiotics sustainable to curb AMR.”, says Rex Clements, CEO at Centrient Pharmaceuticals.