Research and development

The main activity of SCORE members is to further develop and implement wastewater-based epidemiology as an innovative and complementary tool to monitor human lifestyle and health. SCORE members are involved in numerous national and international research projects.

Yearly monitoring campaigns

SCORE has been coordinating a yearly monitoring campaign to assess illicit drug use through wastewater analysis since 2011.
Once a year, SCORE members collect wastewater samples from cities across the world and analyse these to determine amounts of illicit drug markers. Data is then published and provides an overview of illicit drug use across numerous cities in the world. Part of this data is published by the European Centre for Drug and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA) in Lisbon.

Inter-laboratory exercise

To guarantee that only high-quality data is used and published, SCORE organises a yearly inter-laboratory exercise in which any interested laboratory can participate for free.

Guidelines and best practices

Through the research that our members carry out, their expertise and the year-long experience with proficiency testing, we formulate guidelines and best practices that organisations involved in wastewater-based epidemiology can follow to ensure that correct and accurate data can be obtained from wastewater analysis.