The AVMA Executive Board Wednesday approved the policy "Best Management Practices for Pharmaceutical Disposal."

The policy, recommended by the Council on Biologic and Therapeutic Agents, Committee on Environmental Issues, and Council on Veterinary Service, will be provided to the Environmental Protection Agency, which is conducting a survey to identify industries that are disposing of drugs into the nation's waterways and ways to limit that occurrence.

Several AVMA entities determined that veterinarians are "de minimis" contributors to drug disposal in water, and that veterinarians should be exempt from the time-consuming survey. The entities also suggested that the AVMA develop best management practices to further decrease veterinary drug disposal into water.

AVMA staff members have expressed their concerns and intent to EPA officials, who have said unofficially that the veterinary profession will be exempt from the survey for now. It won't be known for sure that veterinarians are, in fact, exempt until the agency publishes its survey plans in the Federal Register later this year.

The new policy is posted on the AVMA Web site www.avma.org in the Reference section under Policy.