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Assessment of Environmental Risk An article Environmental Risk Assessment of Ivermectin: A Case Study has been chosen for assessing environmental risk in this paper. The article was published in Integrated Environmental Assessment and Management in the year 2010. The authors of this article had carried out an environmental risk assessment by following the international as well as European guideline. The major aim of this study is to explore the impact of specific harmful compound: Ivermectin. It is a veterinary parasiticide and it is chosen as the compound for this case study within the project of Environmental Risk Assessment of Pharmaceuticals (ERAPharm) (Liebig et al., 2010). It has been observed that the potential environmental risk associated with the veterinary medicinal products has received concern much before than that for the human medicinal products. The major reason is the impact of the veterinary medicinal product is more severe compared to the human medical products. It is evident that the veterinary medicinal products reach soils directly and quickly than the human medicinal products. The reason is that veterinary medical products for example, ecto and endoparasiticides are applied in order to pasture the animals regularly. It has been an important factor for supporting the livestock. The residues of veterinary medicinal products easily reach the soil through three routes. The direct route is via feces and there are two indirect paths, through spreading the manure or via wash off from the applied products. According to Boxall et al, (2004), veterinary medical products mostly act as biocides. It means they tend to act on the target organisms, f or example, bacteria, invertebrates etc. Hence, the veterinary medical products can be compared with the pesticides and other biocidal products. As veterinary medicinal products act as pesticide, it leads to environmental problems. However, there is a difference between the pesticide and the veterinary medical products. Pesticides are generally released in the environment directly as the parent compound. On the other hand, veterinary medical products are released as a mixture of the parent compound and the metabolites. This paper has focused on conducting a research study for the parasiticide Ivermectin for assessing the environmental impact. The environmental risk assessment of Ivermectin was performed by complying with the international guidelines and the findings of the assessment can be considered as authentic for reaching conclusion. The results of the assessment have demonstrated that Ivermectin is compound which causes risk for the surface water, sediment and dung (Edward et al, 2001). It has been found that the risk is very high for the aquatic compartment due to the extremely high level of toxicity of the Ivermectin which affects the daphnids. Moreover, Ivermectin creates a long term impact in the low pictograms-per-liter range. Risk was indicated for the fish but the study was not adequate for measuring the risk implication of Ivermectin on fish. Hence, in case of the aquatic species Ivermectin has high risk for the daphinds (Garric et al., 2007). From the toxicity test it was identified that risk is associated with the sediment. The test was performed on the organisms of the sediment and it indicted potential risk. Especially, it recognized high level of risk for D. magna. Due to inadequate information it was not possible to assess risk for all organisms and impact of Ivermectin for every stage of life. For example, it failed to study the effect of Ivermectin on the early life stages of fish. It has been found that there is no risk for soil and its organisms such as earthworms, plants, collembolans etc. in case of the sediment potential risk was observed in the three phases of the study. In case of surface water and its organisms, strong conclusion can be drawn only for the daphnia and significant risk has been identified for daphnia. In case of fish, potential risk was indentified in the initial phases. However, due to absence of adequate data, no conclusion can be drawn. Algae are one of the important organisms of surface w ater and it has been found that no risk is associated with use of Ivermectin. From the research findings, it can be implied that significant risk is associated with the organisms of dung. For example, dung beetles and dung flies are exposed to significant risk (Liebig et al., 2010). In the following table risk level for various organisms studied in this research or case study to explore the risk associated with use of Ivermectin: This study has helped to explore the negative impact of the veterinary medical products by assessing the risk associated with Ivermectin. The study was done for assessing the impact of Ivermectin on the routes which helps to reach the compound to the soil and other elements which get in touch with Ivermectin (Jensen, Diao and Hansen, 2009). Surface water, sediment, soil and dung were studied along with its organisms to find the impact of Ivermectin. From the study, it can be concluded that soil and its organisms remain unaffected. In surface water daphnia is exposed to high level of risk. Organisms of dung and sediments are also exposed to high risk. References Boxall, A., Fogg, L., Blackwell, P., Blackwell, P., Kay, P., Pemberton, E. and Croxford, A. (2004). Veterinary medicines in the environment.Springer, pp.1--91. Edwards, C., Atiyeh, R. and Rombke, J. (2001). Environmental impact of avermectins.Reviews of environmental contamination and toxicology, 171, pp.111--138. Garric, J., Vollat, B., Duis, K., P'ery, A., Junker, T., Ramil, M., Fink, G. and Ternes, T. (2007). Effects of the parasiticide ivermectin on the cladoceran i Daphnia magna and the green alga i Pseudokirchneriella subcapitata.Chemosphere, 69(6), pp.903--910. Jensen, J., Diao, X. and Hansen, A. (2009). Single-and two-species tests to study effects of the anthelmintics ivermectin and morantel and the coccidiostatic monensin on soil invertebrates.Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry, 28(2), pp.316--323. Liebig, M., Fernandez, ., Bl"ubaum-Gronau, E., Boxall, A., Brinke, M., Carbonell, G., Egeler, P., Fenner, K., Fernandez, C., Fink, G. and others, (2010). Environmental risk assessment of ivermectin: a case study.Integrated environmental assessment and management, 6(S1), pp.567--587.