News
– The team of this European project will design and implement a unique and innovative wastewater treatment system in Hospital Universitari Parc Taulí
– LIFE GENESYS will allow the development of a preventive alert platform for the risk of resistance -one of the main challenges facing medicine today- that will help manage the environmental impact derived from the prescription of antibiotics in hospitals and health centers
Currently, Spanish hospitals and health centers are not required to have a system for eliminating antibiotics and resistance genes in their wastewater treatment stations. LIFE GENESYS wants to advance future legislation and propose systems that have the capacity to eliminate this pollution from the environment, and thus prevent aquatic ecosystems and therefore people’s health from being affected.
In fact, the scientific community and the World Health Organization have warned that pharmaceutical products, particularly antibiotics, are one of the most alarming pollutants, since their presence in the environment promotes the proliferation of antibiotic resistance, and multi-resistant bacteria that are difficult to treat.
With the aim of eliminating resistant bacteria in hospital wastewater, and avoiding its subsequent environmental impact, the European LIFE GENESYS project will promote an innovative solution in Spain consisting of treatment at source, that is, at the Parc Taulí University Hospital (Sabadell).
Specifically, this solution will be based on the implementation of a new generation treatment train to treat wastewater in a decentralized manner and eliminate drugs, resistance genes and bacteria resistant to antibiotics, thus facilitating that the wastewater discharged from hospitals are free of substances that can alter aquatic systems.
In addition, LIFE GENESYS will develop a digital platform for preventive resistance risk alerts with data collected from the city’s sanitation network. This tool will determine antibiotic levels in hospital effluent, allowing healthcare professionals to make informed decisions when prescribing antibiotics.
This project has obtained funding from the LIFE 2023 call for Environment and Climate Action, within the “Circular Economy and Quality of Life” subprogram of the European Union, and will be carried out by the consortium formed by Cetaqua, as coordinating entity, in collaboration with Aigües Sabadell CASSA, Apria Systems, LABAQUA, the Hospital Universitari Parc Taulí and the Institut d’Investigació i Innovació Parc Taulí (I3PT).
“The collaborative work of these institutions will allow the integration of different areas of knowledge that include the management of biological waste, the management of infections by resistant bacteria, the city’s drainage network, wastewater treatment and innovative water treatments, with the objective of launching a pilot solution”, highlighted Òscar Quijada, researcher at Parc Taulí, at the project initiation meeting that was held recently.
Thanks to this innovative and replicable solution, as explained by the I3PT team of researchers, it will contribute to promoting the objectives proposed by the EU within the framework of the development of innovative strategies to fight against antibiotic resistance, offering decentralized and more efficient solutions.
