The idea of determining the consumption of illicit drugs on the basis of analysis of wastewater was introduced by Daughton and Ternes already in 1999
[1]. The development of new methodologies and advances in analytical chemistry has gradually led to the emergence of the term “sewage epidemiology” in the scientific area. In his study in 2005, Zuccato pointed to the possibility of analyzing illicit drugs in wastewater, putting the Daughton and Ternes hypothesis into practice for the first time
[2]. He gradually found that based on the analysis of the dominant drug metabolite it is possible to estimate the number of doses used at the selected sewerage area. After 15 years, it can be stated that this scientific field is constantly evolving and progressing. This is evidenced by studies from 2019 and 2020, which describe the possibilities of monitoring various groups of endogenous human metabolism biomarkers, new types of drugs and psychoactive substances (NPS), the issue of pesticide and mycotoxin contamination of food and drinking water, or the possibility of identifying resistance genes for a selected antibiotic in the population under review
[3][4][5][6][7]. For example, based on the quantitative measurement of specific biomarkers in wastewater from different regions and cities, we can subsequently evaluate the lifestyle of a particular population, the incidence of certain types of diseases, as well as the negative or positive impacts of the environment on its health
[8]. However, it should be noted that the monitoring of the health status of a population in a given region may not always be welcome. It can point to environmental pollution in a given area and its subsequent impact on a region or a certain population, which may ultimately have an impact, for example, on the tourism, real estate market, and the like.
It can be said that the development of wastewater monitoring is mainly due to research activities taking place in Europe. In 2013, the COST ES1307 project was launched under the auspices of the EU Horizon 2020 Framework Program, bringing together several experts in the field of epidemiology and drugs and pharmaceuticals analysis in wastewater. Wastewater = based epidemiology connected with early detection in the case of a pandemic situation is just the next step in public health control
[7].