Urine to be tested to estimate drug usage among population

Urine testing provides "exciting and promising" opportunities in estimating drug usage in a population, the European drugs agency has said.

Ireland is one of 16 European countries involved in a project to establish and compare drug consumption rates by tests at wastewater treatment plants.

Experts can establish "precise estimates" of the total quantity of particular drugs consumed by a community by measuring the levels of drug metabolites, or breakdown products, excreted in urine.

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Source: Cormac O'Keefe, Irish Examiner,18/03/2011