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Corporate Responsibility Report 2008

Q&As

Here we respond to questions raised by our stakeholders.

Your inhaler products have a large environmental impact. What are you doing about this?
We have been phasing out CFCs from our inhaler products for the last 15 years, replacing these gases with HFAs which have a lower climate change impact (16 per cent that of CFCs). Less than two per cent of our inhalers now contain CFCs and we have committed to a complete phase-out by 2010. As part of our new climate strategy, we are exploring ways to reduce the amount of HFAs released from our inhaler products and we are looking into alternative propellants.

We also offer dry powder inhalers for asthma sufferers which contain no greenhouse gases. These are not suitable for all patients, particularly children and the elderly, as they do not contain propellants and rely on a person’s lung power for the active ingredients to be administered.

How can the pharmaceutical manufacturing process be made more efficient?
Making medicines is highly regulated and is complicated due to the number of process steps required. We know that there is more we need to do to improve efficiency and we have set a target to double the average materials efficiency of manufacturing processes for new products introduced between 2006 and 2010.

Are pharmaceutical residues present in drinking water and are they a risk to humans?
Our studies have shown that GSK pharmaceutical products are either not present in watercourses, or are present at low concentrations. Our risk assessments demonstrate that these concentrations do not pose a risk to human health or the environment. But we are not complacent and we continually monitor the latest scientific studies and findings to improve our risk assessment methodology.

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