COLUMBUS – Ohioans are urged to dispose of unwanted or expired prescription drugs Saturday during the 15th National Prescription Drug Take Back Day.
National Prescription Drug Take Back Day: Sat., April 28,10 a.m.-2:00 p.m.
Medicines left in homes are highly susceptible to misuse and abuse and a survey shows that a majority of misused and abused prescription drugs are obtained from family and friends, authorities say, so Ohioans are encouraged to rid their homes of potentially dangerous expired, unused, and unwanted prescription drugs at one of more than 250 sites statewide.
The service is unable to take liquids, inhalers, or any type of needle or syringe.
The National Survey on Drug Use and Health reports that more than 115 Americans die daily because of opioid overdose.
RELATED: Study: 1 in 4 Ohioans touched by drug abuse
Last fall Americans turned in 456 tons of prescription drugs and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration reports that previous Prescription Drug Take Back Day events have removed more than nine million pounds of pharmaceuticals from circulation nationwide since 2010.
Ohio’s Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown and his Republican counterpart, Rob Portman, have sponsored a bipartisan bill, called the Providing Officers with Electronic Resources, or POWER, Act, to help Ohio law enforcement officers detect fentanyl and protect themselves from accidental overdoses by giving them access to the same high-tech screening devices Brown secured for Customs and Border Protection agents.