Increasingly potent drug ingredients offer growing market as manufacturers address worker safety

 This development has also spawned efforts by pharmaceutical ingredient manufacturers to increase production, while assuring the safety of workers in their plants who might be exposed to these powerful new chemicals.

In the C&EN cover story, Senior Correspondent Ann Thayer points out that these powerful agents are part of the rapidly expanding anticancer drug market, which racks up $48 billion in sales each year and is growing at twice the rate of the overall pharmaceutical market. These substances include targeted drugs, which zero in on disease tissues and cells rather than exposing the entire body to any harmful effects.

The growth in demand for these potent drug ingredients is contributing to an increase in the number of manufacturers that specialize in making them. As a result, pharmaceutical manufacturers are building new facilities that can operate at higher and safer levels of containment and are adding specialized equipment to protect workers from exposure to these potent materials, the article notes. -American Chemical Society