PREMIER partners publish new scientific paper: Critical insights into the potential risks of antipsychotic drugs to fish, including through effects on behaviour

Antipsychotic drugs are widely prescribed for the long-term treatment of psychiatric disorders, and are increasingly detected in rivers, lakes, and coastal waters, due to their incomplete removal during wastewater treatment or direct discharge from untreated sources. However, these neuroactive compounds remain largely overlooked in pharmaceutical environmental risk assessment (ERA).

This review explores the risks antipsychotics may pose to aquatic life, particularly fish. It highlights the need to move beyond traditional toxicity tests, which focus on survival and reproduction and advocates the need for assessments of behavioural disruptions, such as movement, social interaction, foraging and predator avoidance, which underpin individual and population fitness. Using zebrafish as a model species, the review explores these, and other, ecologically relevant behaviours that could serve as early warning indicators of adverse effects of neuroactive drugs, including antipsychotics.

This work aligns closely with the goals of the PREMIER project, to better evaluate, prioritise and tailor the ERA of pharmaceuticals. By integrating exposure and targeted assessment of effects (e.g. on behaviour and neurological signalling) within test organisms, such as zebrafish, PREMIER is paving the way for improved environmental testing and the development of more sustainable medicines. This study reinforces PREMIER’s mission to safeguard aquatic ecosystems while enabling continued medical innovation.

See the article here.