Make Every Day "Take Back Day" Says DEA
Prescription drug addiction in United States has reached epidemic level according to Center for Disease Control
The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) has launched a new campaign encouraging the public to make Every Day Take Back Day by utilizing year-round collection sites to dispose of unneeded and unwanted medications. The DEA hosted its 25th National Take Back Day in October 2023. Up to that date, Take Back Day had removed more than 8,650 tons of medication from circulation since its inception 2010.
Marijuana and alcohol get the most attention for being gateway drugs, however prescription drug addiction is on the rise, so much so that the Centers for Disease Control has designated the issue an epidemic. Prescription drugs are one of the paths that people, especially adolescents, are taking without understanding the consequences of substance dependence/abuse and where it can lead them.
For more than a decade, DEA has worked with state and local law enforcement partners to host National Prescription Drug Take Back Days each year to help Americans rid their homes of unneeded medications. The Take Back program has received an overwhelming response from communities across the country. In 2023, DEA collected more than 1.2 million pounds of unneeded medications at more than 4,600 sites nationwide during their Take Back events.
DEA has now registered over 17,000 pharmacy sites as authorized collectors to help Americans dispose of unused prescription drugs any day of the year. These safe disposal receptacles, in addition to DEA’s annual Take Back Day events, provide the public with an easy, no-cost opportunity to anonymously dispose of medications that are no longer needed.
Take Back Day has helped Americans easily rid their homes of unwanted or expired medications. These medications can be a gateway to addiction and have helped fuel the opioid epidemic. According to a report published by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), a majority of people who use a prescription medication for a non-medical purpose obtained that medication from a family member or friend. Removing unnecessary medications from the home can help prevent situations involving taking medication not as intended or dosed, taking someone else’s prescription, and taking the medicine for euphoric effects rather than medicinal purposes.
“DEA has worked closely with the registrant community to dramatically increase the number of permanent disposal sites accessible to Americans. As a result, members of the public can now go to any one of 17,000 pharmacies across the nation to dispose of unused prescription medications any day of the year,” said DEA Administrator Anne Milgram. “I encourage everyone to take advantage of these collection sites and make every day Take Back Day.”
In Carbon County, any day collection sites can be found at three locations in Red Lodge: on the first floor of the County Courthouse, at Red Lodge Drug Store and at Beartooth Billings Clinic. In addition, in the Clarks Fork Valley, Bridger Police Chief Mike Buechler will provide bags designed specifically for the disposal of medications free of charge upon request.