Expired Medication Disposal in Syrian Households

What happens to medicines in Syrian homes after they expire? This study, the lab's founding research programme, set out to answer a question that sits at the intersection of public health, environmental safety and antimicrobial resistance, and had never been systematically examined in Syria, where years of conflict and the COVID-19 pandemic intensified medication hoarding in households.

Conducted at the Faculty of Pharmacy at Damascus University in 2022, the study surveyed 1,031 Syrian adults using a pre-validated questionnaire. The findings describe a country holding far more medicine than it can safely manage: a quarter of households kept more than twenty unused medication items at home, with topical products, vitamins, syrups and painkillers the most common. Nearly three quarters of respondents disposed of expired medicines in household bins, and almost one in ten continued using medication after expiry.

The study's most striking finding is who gets it wrong: everyone. Respondents with medical training were no more likely to dispose of medicines safely than those without, pointing to a systemic gap rather than a public-awareness one. Knowledge alone did not change behaviour.

The implications reach beyond the household. Unsafe disposal contaminates soil and water and contributes to antimicrobial resistance, a global health threat with acute stakes in a country rebuilding its health infrastructure. The study recommends integrating disposal education into Syria's health curricula, national public-awareness campaigns, and the development of drug take-back systems as part of pharmaceutical policy in Syria's recovery.

The research has been presented at the EMPHNET Regional Conference in Amman (2024), the Students for Global Health Conference in Newcastle (2025), and the Syrian American Medical Society's First Scientific Conference in Damascus (2025), and continues to develop as a research programme on sustainable medicine use in Syria.

Sham Alhousiki, Haya Alhousiki, with Dr Samar Elzeer, Faculty of Pharmacy, Damascus University.