Saturday is “National Drug Take Back Day,” which is designed to give you a chance to get rid of old prescription medications you no longer need.
Sioux City police Sergeant Tom Gill says they will have three locations where people can leave their unneeded medications from 10 a.m. until 2 p.m.
Gill says you bring the medications to the site, and there will be a box to put them in. The event is organized nationally by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency, and you can find a take-back site in your area by going to dea.gov/takebackday.
Sergeant Gill says tablets, patches, and other forms of prescription drugs will be accepted. Liquids such as cough syrup can also be turned in, but must be in a sealed container. He says they will have officers at each site.”The reason the officer is there is so no drugs are taken out of the box. There’s no questions asked, they can come and dump their old medications, that’s all they need to do.”
Vaping cartridges will be accepted if the lithium batteries are removed. The Iowa Office of Drug Control Policy says old pet medications can also be dropped off. Syringes or any illegal drugs are not accepted. There are also 400 permanent take back sites across the state if you can’t get out to a site Saturday.
(By Woody Gottburg, KSCJ, Sioux City)