Letter to the Editor
Drug Disposal
Published Friday, April 18, 2008
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To the editor:
I have a medical condition that has, during the past two years, required me to get prescription medications for pain.
When these medications do not work, I am left with a bottle of highly potent narcotic medication and I’m not sure how to dispose of it.
Pharmacies are precluded from accepting them for disposal. The North Pole Police Department told me to flush them — bad idea because of groundwater contamination. The Alaska State Troopers office contacted Fairbanks Memorial Hospital, which refused the responsibility of incineration based upon the chain of custody liability. An FMH representative suggested I crush the pills, mix them with food scraps and dispose of that in the trash.
I envisioned stoned, and later dead, ravens and squirrels littering the transfer sites. The troopers could not take the medication because it was not evidence in a case, but suggested I burn the crushed pills in my barbecue grill, which I did.
My observation is this: With the amount of prescription drugs being taken by young people to get high and the street value of these drugs, why do we not have a law enforcement supervised disposal facility in this area?
I’m sure signing a few forms to establish chain of custody would be no more inconvenient that trying to figure out why so many kids are addicted to OxyContin and Vicodin.
Community Discussion
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Drop one or two in an empty soda can and toss it in the garbage. If its not crushed and mixed with food the ravens and squirrels will have less of a chance of ingesting it.
Don't toss the original container until its completely empty. Nothing would make a dumpster diver happier than finding a bottle full of pills clearly labeled as VICODIN.
You could also call around for a biohazard disposal service, but thats gonna cost ya.
Unbelieveable
When you are finished one of the normal bodly functions, would you like someone to come "finish" the job for you ??? (and bring the paper)For heavens sake has the "drugs" destroyed that much of your brain?
Ahhhh the sound of Faux Alaskans getting their little sphincters in a bind!! Blustering on and on how stupid everyone else is but them. "Unbelievable"!!
Don’t worry writer, we get what you are trying to say. The short-timer dolces are just mad that all they understand from your letter is that you don’t have the intelligence to throw out some stupid pills.
We appreciate you letter, lets hope the STD's don’t keep drinking the ground water; it seems to get them pretty angry.
Someone please flush some anti-depressants down next their wells, please.
YouMustBConfused
I very much understand your plight. To help you out, I will come over to your house or meet you at a undisclosed location and take those pesky pills away for proper disposal.
Wait a second...the Police Department was called about this?! Good grief. Another example of holding up the phone line wasting time and resources.
There are a lot of options. How about mixing them with used cat litter? No cat? Mix them into paint thinner and dispose of the paint thinner properly. Or grind them up and put them in the oil from your next oil change. Then, dispose of the oil properly.
A quick Google search suggests griding them up and mixing with undesirable substances, such as coffee grounds, and then putting them in a sealed container, such as a coffee can.
You clearly didn't try hard enough to think of options.
I agree with Bikebuilder... I'd be more than happy to dispose of those for ya. Just let me know where/when to meet you. Then, you can rest assured that none will make it to the youths or animals in our community!
No wait, me first! I want 'em! Don't give 'em to those other guys.
And while your giving me the goods, I'll also take all your unused Miles Davis CDs. There's times when absolutely nothing sounds better than Miles playing the same note for an hour straight.
Really?
Really? This is what we have to talk about? We can't figure out how to dispose of pills? Never thought I would say this, but can we discuss gas prices? The capital budget? anyone?
There are many established agency that accept medication for disposal. If you go online and search you will find many university medical departments, pharmacies and medication clearing houses that will dispose of them. The only issue would be that you would have to pay nominal shipping charges. Go to yahoo or google and type in "medication disposal" and you will see your options.
If you are so concerned about the flushing of your unused drugs ruining the environment, you should probably refrain from urinating or defecating as well. Your body doesn’t totally metabolize many of the drugs you take and you end up excreting them. So really you have two options if you care so much about the environment. Stop taking the drugs altogether, or just hold it.
I've heard Bassett will accept and dispose of unwanted medications, provided you have a military ID.
For the civilian community, you need to write your elected representatives and tell them you want a public program that provides a reasonable means for disposing of leftover medications. The police probably aren't the best agency for this as it would take away from their primary purpose, Perhaps we could make drug disposal, open to public dropoff, a requirement for CON approval. (Make it retroactive so FMH would have to participate.) Alternatively or in addition, we could require all pharmancies operating in the state to participate in the program.
As for some of the comments above, I can't wait to watch some of you suffer through excruciating pain without drugs. For some of the others, long term severe chronic pain creates a mental condition very much like being stoned. The drugs merely attenuate the pain to a point where the sufferer can function more or less like other people.
Christine,
Unlike most of the commenters here, who can't see a problem past tomorrow, and who don't care about their personal impacts on others, I agree with you, and have the same problem. I am sitting on presciption drugs because of a lack of good options to dispose of them. Prescription medication is showing up in ground water all over the country, so people should care. Oh wait, I forget, this is Alaska, it's different up here, we don't care what's happening in the rest of the country, and we don't know how to take lessons from there either.
Good god, the landfill has a liner protecting the enviroment. Pills are the least damaging things disposed of there. Chuck em'. Place them in undesireable trash and throw them away. The rest of your trash is probably more damaging to the enviroment...batteries, plastics, styrofoam, etc.
It's been a long week, I needed a good laugh - this was definitely it!
YouMustBeConfused - I'll check around the med-samples closet and see if I can find some anti-depressants to flush. Notice no one flushes good tequilla!
Have a good weekend folks!
-RK
While we are on the subject, I wish there was some way to recycle empty pill bottles. Almost all are plastic clearly marked as recyclable. Over the years, I've accumulated a very large collection and I don't want to simple throw them away nor have I found a good reuse for them. I've be willing to crush them, pack them in a USPS Flat Rate box, and send them to a recycling center in the lower 48 if I knew where to send them.
Sorry, "I'd be willing ..." -- my fingers and brain weren't communicating very well.
Griff, I recently heard a rumor that a local group was looking into plastic collections for recycling purposes. Maybe we should watch the public announcements.
-RK
i_play_outside - that'd be worth a few hours of my time per month or even per week.
Do what I do. I mix all of my "sensitive" trash with the leavings of my 3 dogs.
If you are willing to go through that mess, congrats, you are hard core!
I understand what she means. I have old needles from my insulin and other diabetic meds I can no longer take. We have a problem on our hands about our disposal practices up here. I also have film developer from long ago film processing but our local officials don't have a way of disposing of that either. Then they want to regulate us about the trash in our yards. Duh, don't regulate until you can provide a solution.
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