Dolores Repici used to just toss her expired medications in the garbage.
Then she heard a nationwide program to help consumers get expired and old medications out of their homes. She now holds on to her old pills and takes them her local fire department for disposal.
“I know people who would just flush them but I think about the water system and the oceans,” said Repici, a retired childcare business owner who splits her time between her daughter’s home in DeKalb County and Florida. ‘That’s just like the worst thing you can do.”
Several years ago the Drug Enforcement Administration launched the “National Take-Back Initiative”, which is designed to help people like Repici get rid of their old medications.
From 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday, consumers can do the same at various locations throughout the metro Atlanta area. The service is free, anonymous and no questions are asked.
This is the third year for the program, which helps prevent accidental ingestion by children or pets, pill abuse, prescription medication theft and people inadvertently taking the wrong medication by ridding homes of expired, unused and unwanted prescription and over-the-counter drugs.
Last October, Americans turned in 324 tons of prescription drugs at more than 4,000 sites operated by the DEA and its thousands of state and local law enforcement partners, according to the agency.
Dr. Gaylord Lopez, director of the Georgia Poison Center, housed at Grady Memorial Hospital, said there is a common misconception that it’s fine to wash old drugs down the sink or flush them in the toilet. “Imagine if a whole community started dumping all their liquids and pills,” he said.
Indeed, keeping consumers safe and protecting the environment are priorities.
Unused medications could easily fall into the hands of young children or taken by others in the household, who think the one-size-fits-all approach is fine for medication. It’s not, he said.
He recalled the case of a young mother whose son had head lice. Her sister’s child once had the same problem, so she asked whether she could give the medication to her son. But because she never talked to a doctor or pharmacist first, she didn’t know the medication should have been taken topically not orally.
The boy had a seizure and, fortunately, recovered.
Additionally, some expired medications lose their potency. Antibiotics, for instance, once expired will not be at their optimal strength to fight infections. “With antibiotics you want them to be at their strongest and to take the medicine as prescribed by the doctors,” he said. “Those two components are critical with dealing with infections.”
Even worse, some prescription medications “break down into byproducts that could be even more dangerous,” for some people if taken.
For the last several years, Keep Cobb Beautiful, the Cobb County Police Department and Cobb County Water System have collected old medications twice a year. Keep Cobb Beautiful also accepts items such as needles. liquids, sharps and gels, while the DEA does not.
Since the Cobb program began in 2010, more than 17,820 pounds of pharmaceuticals and related materials have been collected, said Terrilyn Hannah, Cobb’s public program coordinator and executive director of Keep Cobb Beautiful Inc. The drop off site for Saturday is at the Cobb County Super Station 8/Police Precinct 1, 2380 Cobb Parkway N.W. in Kennesaw.
The goal, “is to keep pharmaceutical out of the landfills and water supply,” said Hannah. “A lot of the contaminants that are found in the water system come from the contents commonly found in prescription drugs.”
The program also provide tips for people to dispose of medications. If they can’t make Saturday’s event, for example, Hannah and others suggests taking medications out of their bottles, removing any identifying labels and throwing them in the garbage mixed in with used coffee grounds or cat litter - something thieves won’t be so eager to rummage through.
To find a collection site near you, go to: www.deadiversion.usdoj.gov/drug_disposal/takeback/.
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