Detection and effects of selected pharmaceutical compounds from selected water bodies in the Eastern Cape Province, South Africa

Abstract

Water is significantly essential of all-natural assets recognized over the earth. It is necessary to biota, mostly ecosystem, public health, food processing, and economic sustainability. The protection of potable water is crucial for health. Several pollutants that are made up of chemical and microbiological substances affect drinking water. Those pollutants create severe medical challenges, and as a result, the quality of water turns out to be inadequate. Frequently unsatisfactory quality of water induces various health problems in people. Therefore, water quality needs to be tested chemically and microbiologically. This thesis focuses on the prevalence of pharmaceutical products from the rivers (streams) and wastewater treatment plants found along the rivers of Makhanda, Alice, and King William's Town. The physical and chemical parameters were as follows: Temperature ranged from 9.97 to 22.03 °C, pH from 4.32 to 10.60, turbidity from 4.63 to 318 NTU, electrical conductivity from 8.70 to 381.27 mS/m, nitrate from not detected to 100 mg/L, chemical oxygen demand from 5.33 to 296 mg/L, dissolved oxygen from 2.43 to 7.70 mg/L, chloride from not detected to 180.67 mg/L, phosphate from not detected to 0.55 mg/L and sulfate from not detected to 193 mg/L. The results indicate that turbidity, sulfate, and EC adversely affect surface water sources; high concentrations of such parameters verify that further studies are necessary. Hence, some of them do not cause detrimental effects on human health. High levels were principally in rainy seasons, which could have resulted from contaminants' washout from point source pollution into surface water in rains. Other parameters overstepped the acceptable ranges of the Target Water Quality Range, World Health Organisation, and South African National Standard guidelines in some investigation regions. Water samples were freeze-dried to prepare solid-phase extraction and ultra-performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometer to identify composites. Levonorgestrel and ethinylestradiol were not detected throughout the water samples. Four antiretroviral drugs were detected: Lopinavir ranged from not detected to 1141.8 ng/L, Emtricitabine from not detected to 18757.4 ng/L, Nevirapine from not detected to 10047.2 ng/L, and Efavirenz from 40.6 to 55844.6 ng/L. The bacterial colonies ranged from 1.07E +06 to 9.70E +05 CFU/mL in Makhanda region, 1.03E +04 to 7.93E +04 CFU/mL in Alice region and 1.08E +05 to 9.33E +05 CFU/mL in King William's Town region. Analytical profile index 20E system identified Shigella spp as the most dominant at 81.5% identity. Furthermore, identified Chromobacterium violaceum, Pasteurella pneumotropica, and Pneumonia ssp rhinosceromatis at 97.7 %, 75.1%, and 69% identity. Antibiotic susceptibility testing has shown that Ciprofloxacin was susceptible in all water sample sites except for the lower stream of Tyhume River. Amoxicillin has shown resistance to many parts of the water sample sites. The 16S rRNA (DNA) gene sequencing detected microorganisms in water samples. Firmicutes were the most dominant phylum with high abundance in all water samples. Phyla Firmicutes and Bacteriodota have proven that they can survive in wastewater treatment plants. Entirely, this survey reveals that water is potentially unsafe for consumers' health and stresses the need to treat the wastewater treatment plants and support maintainable farming methods for preventing detrimental health damages.