Abstract
Population growth and urbanization are exerting anthropogenic pressures on water resources and their ecosystems. Among anthropogenic pollutants, pharmaceuticals for human use are released into the environment mainly through treated and untreated wastewater. Several studies have determined the occurrence of these compounds in inland waters in Europe and North America. However, in the countries of the South, little information is known, which justifies continuing efforts to inform the state of contamination of aquatic environments by drug residues. Continued exposure of aquatic organisms to these biologically active substances can promote their bioaccumulation. Recent publications suggest the need to develop scenarios on the exposure and risk implications of drug residues and their transformation products on these non-target organisms. In this context, targeted approaches and, more recently, non-targeted approaches using liquid chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry are promising methodologies to be used to inform the state of pharmaceutical contamination of waters and marine organisms.In view of the above, this work was based on directed and non-directed analyses that were applied to environmental samples (aqueous matrices and biota). In the end, this study made it possible: 1) to make the first diagnosis of the level of contamination of surface and groundwater by pharmaceutical products in Cameroon, around its capital Yaoundé and 2) to characterize the metabolites of the antidepressant Venlafaxine in mussels (Mytilus Galloprovincialis).