PORTSMOUTH, Ohio — The Scioto County Sheriff’s Office will give residents a chance to safely get rid of unused or expired prescription medications this weekend as part of a national drug disposal campaign.
The sheriff’s office will take part in the DEA’s National Prescription Drug Take Back Day on Saturday, Oct. 24, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. outside its headquarters at 1025 16th St. in Portsmouth, Sheriff David Thoroughman announced. The collection is set up as a drive-thru, and the drop-off is free and anonymous, with no questions asked.
Thoroughman said medicine cabinets in many homes hold drugs that pose a real danger if they end up in the wrong hands, calling Take Back Day “a simple way for families to make their homes safer.”
“Please take a few minutes on Oct. 24 to clean out your medicine cabinet,” Thoroughman said. “It could save a life.”
The sheriff’s office said leaving old medications in household trash allows them to be retrieved and misused, while flushing them down the toilet can contaminate local water supplies. Teenagers frequently get prescription drugs from family medicine cabinets, the office said, making safe at-home disposal an important tool for preventing accidental poisonings, overdoses and substance abuse.
Saturday’s collection will be the 31st National Prescription Drug Take Back Day since the DEA launched the program in 2010. The take-back event is held each spring and fall at thousands of sites nationwide. At the most recent Take Back Day in April, the DEA and more than 4,300 law enforcement agencies collected over 642,000 pounds of unwanted medications at more than 4,400 collection sites across the country. Since the program began, more than 21 million pounds of medication have been collected nationally, according to the DEA.
The information contained in this story was obtained from the Scioto County Emergency Management Agency and the Scioto County Sheriff’s Office.
