Students at study visit to AstraZeneca. Photo: Martina Schultz.

In the olden days, a pharmacist was also a "pill maker", that is, they shaped their pills themselves with their hands. Nowadays, tablets and capsules are made industrially using advanced machines with high capacity. A group of students from BIG got to see it with their own eyes during a study visit to AstraZeneca at the beginning of November.

It all started when alumna Martina Schultz contacted Birgitta Åkerman and asked if BIG had any students who might be interested in a study visit at AstraZeneca. Yes, Birgitta thought so and quickly assembled a group of fourteen students, most of them from the Master's programmes in Microbiology and Molecular Life Sciences.

Visit to the tablet factory

On November 10, Birgitta and the students travelled down to Södertälje to visit AstraZeneca's factory in Gärtuna, on the east side of the Södertälje canal. There they were welcomed by Martina, who is now head of Site Support and safety, health and environment in the tablet factory. Martina also has a background in quality assurance and gave us an insight into this. Her colleague Marcus Norlinder, who is a process engineer, talked about his daily work. After coffee with sandwiches, Martina and Marcus gave a presentation of AstraZeneca in general and the Gärtuna factory in particular. It is actually one of the world's largest pharmaceutical manufacturing facilities – 13 billion tablets are produced here every year!

When everyone had put on borrowed overalls, shoes and hair protection, a tour of the factory took place. There, they got to see different steps in the production of a heart medicine, a beta blocker that, among other things, lowers blood pressure. Marcus gave the visitors a good insight into how complicated the process is: small grains of sand must be coated both with the active substance and with something that regulates how the substance is taken up. Finally, an outer casing is added so that the tablet should be easy to swallow. Martina told us that different countries have different requirements and wishes.

A possible employer?

As manager at AstraZeneca, Martina naturally had an ulterior motive for attracting students on study visits: more employees are needed in the factory. Above all, there is a lack of well-educated microbiologists and a master's degree is required. Martina herself obtained a master's degree in biology in 2006 and has worked at AstraZeneca for many years. She emphasized that the company offers good career opportunities; once you have started, there are many conceivable career paths.

Some of the students were asked afterwards what they got out of the study visit and they were very positive. Seeing how the manufacturing of tablets is done was interesting, thought Aparna Adarsh: "It is such a complex process which requires a lot of verification and auditing in every step. I was delighted when they explained everything to us in a detailed manner.”

The visitors also got a good impression of the company: "AstraZeneca seems like a lot of fun to work at and they provide the opportunity to develop and, for example, change work roles within the company." writes Marie Brenning. Marie adds that she "would appreciate more study visits like this to make contact with future workplaces/employers. My education (Molecular biologist) is very theoretical and does not include much practice, so all chances for contact with working life are welcomed!"