DEA National Prescription Drug Take-back Day, April 30th

The Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) has designated the 30th of April, National Prescription (Rx) Drug Take-Back Day.

National Drug Take-back Day is April 30th, 2022.MGN Image

Each year, law enforcement agencies nationwide mobilize to receive prescription drugs from citizens. According to DEA.gov through National Prescription Drug Take-Back Day, the DEA is:

encouraging the public to remove unneeded medications from their homes as a measure of preventing medication misuse and opioid addiction from ever starting.

Kentuckians have suffered from the Opiod pandemic, but have many places to turn in the medications on April 30th.Kentucky Office of Drug Control

In Kentucky, the Office of Drug Control Policy (ODCP) makes it easy for Kentuckians to find the nearest location to return their prescription drugs on April 30th. The site offers an easy search by county. In total, Kentucky has 193 Permanent Prescription Drug Disposal locations in its’ 115 counties.

The opioid epidemic in the United States affected 1.6 million people into an opioid use disorder in 2019, according to the U.S. Department of Human and Health Services (HHS). In 2017, the HHS declared the opioid epidemic a public health emergency.

Prescription drugs propose a human threat, beyond illicit use of opioids. The threat is pharmaceutical pollution. Pharmaceutical pollution, according to the Harvard Medical Review, is pollution to the environment from prescription drugs. This threat can affect humans by our consumption of food which may be contaminated with prescription medication, through water or sewage runoff, commonly.

Getting your medications to law enforcement on National Prescription Drug Day, helps our community, families, and environment. The Drug Enforcement Agency looks to reflect its commitment to Americans’ health and safety, through this program.

Credits:

Drug Enforcement Agency

U. S. Department of Human and Health Services

Harvard Medical Review