Communities across the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) Omaha Division safely disposed of 10,554 pounds of prescription medications during the 24th National Prescription Drug Take Back Day, April 23. Working with 132 law enforcement partners, the DEA Omaha Division hosted 177 Take Back Day sites in Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska and South Dakota. North Dakota, which boasts more than 100 year-round pharmaceutical collection sites, did not host Take Back locations on April 23.
Nationally, DEA and its law enforcement partners came together to protect communities from prescription misuse by safely disposing of 663,725 pounds of unneeded medications at nearly 5,000 collection sites across the country. Since its inception in 2010, DEA’s bi-annual National Prescription Take Back Day has removed more than 17 million pounds of unnecessary medications from communities across the country.
“We encourage those who weren’t able to safely dispose of their unneeded prescription medication at a Take Back site on April 23, to locate a year-round receptacle within their community,” DEA Omaha Division Special Agent in Charge Justin C. King said. “Law enforcement partners and pharmacies across the nation host these year-round sites, where it’s easy to get rid of prescriptions in a safe and anonymous manner, while also removing the threat of temptation for experimentation from their houses.”
For more than a decade, Take Back Day has helped Americans easily rid their homes of unneeded medications—those that are old, unwanted, or expired. These medications can be a gateway to addiction, and have helped fuel the opioid epidemic.
DEA continues to expand opportunities to make safe disposal of medications more accessible nationwide. A list of permanent drug-drop boxes located in communities across the country can be found here. Safe medication disposal receptacles along with DEA Take Back events provide families easy, no-cost opportunities to get rid of unnecessary medicines stored in the home that can be susceptible to abuse and theft.
Complete results for DEA’s spring National Prescription Drug Take Back Day are available at Take Back Day (dea.gov).