Throw Your Drugs Away Safely Day (Sat. 25th)

[n2doc]

By Maryn McKenna September 21, 2010 | 5:12 pm |


There are people in this world — I’m not pointing fingers — who have extra antibiotics hanging about their houses.

Naturally, this would not be you, any of you, since you know that it’s important to finish prescriptions or risk the development of resistant bacteria. You wouldn’t forget to take your regularly scheduled doses. You wouldn’t stop early because it feels like you’re better. And you certainly wouldn’t save some drugs because someone else without insurance might benefit from them.

(Right? Please. These are not smart ideas.)

But let’s say there’s a household with extra drugs lying around. Maybe a doctor did an extra round of tests and switched a prescription to something else mid-course. Maybe someone moved away. Maybe someone died.

In which case: What do you do with them?

It’s not a good idea to just put them in the trash: Kids and pets can too-easily fish them out. (Ask me about the day my cat ate most of an old bottle of ibuprofen. Yes, she’s OK, thanks.) Most people’s impetus is to flush them. That’s an even worse idea. Tossing antibiotics into the toilet takes the risk away from your household, but it transfers the risk to all households, by adding them to wastewater.


more

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2010/09/public-service-announcement-throw-your-drugs-away-safely-day/

[kirby]

1. Here is the link...

Program link: http://www.deadiversion.usdoj.gov/takeback/

Search for local collection site link:

https://www.deadiversion.usdoj.gov/NTBI/ntbi-pub.pub?_flowId=public-flow

[meegbear]

2. I envision postage paid envelopes addressed to Keith Richards

[Wickerman]

3. +1

no safer place to send them!

[bemildred]

4. There ought to be a disposal service for all drugs, not just prescription drugs.

For discussion of contamination issues, prescription/non-prescription is the wrong category.

[HuckleB]

5. Indeed.

And there ought to be a way to dispose of them regularly.

[bemildred]

6. I live in a county that has disposal sites that take what I bring in, as far as drugs.

No questions asked. It's fairly common in California now. Not everything in this state is disfunctional.

[HuckleB]

7. I'm glad some states are on top of it.

Oregon continues to hem and haw about setting up a program, but there has been little progress.

[HuckleB]

8. Kick (already recommended).