Ten Thousand Pounds of Prescription Drugs Turned In

Posted by azdrugrehabctr on November 12, 2013 under Prescription Drugs | Comments are off for this article

On October 26th, the DEA held its prescription drug take-back day. Although this was a nationwide event, the Phoenix DEA office reported that there were 90 collection sites around the state of Arizona, which netted more than ten thousand pounds of left over prescription drugs.

With over five tons collected that day, the total collected for the state over the past few years has been 29 tons (58,000 pounds). Prescription drug take-back programs have effectively discarded several hundred thousand tons of unused and unwanted medications. The idea is to help get them off the street and out of medicine cabinets to help prevent that type of substance abuse.

According to the DEA’s release, “Disposal of unwanted, unused or expired drugs is one of four strategies for reducing prescription drug abuse and diversion laid out in Epidemic: Responding to America’s Prescription Drug Abuse Crisis. The other strategies include education of health care providers, patients, parents and youth; enhancing and encouraging the establishment of prescription drug monitoring programs in all the states; and increased enforcement to address doctor shopping and pill mills.”