Drug take-back event set for Saturday

WASILLA — Mat-Su residents with leftover or expired prescription medications can dispose of those drugs Saturday in a free, no-questions-asked drug take-back event scheduled at locations in Palmer, Wasilla and Talkeetna.

The anonymous event, part of a nationwide collaboration between the federal Drug Enforcement Agency and local governmental and nonprofit agencies, is set from 10 a.m. until 2 p.m. at Palmer and Wasilla Fred Meyer locations and at the Talkeetna Sunshine Clinic, located at Mile 4.4 of the Talkeetna Spur Road. The Valley events are being coordinated by the cities of Palmer and Wasilla, Thrive Mat-Su and the Mat-Su Borough.

“We work closely with police departments and troopers with this program, and there will be an officer at the locations,” said Michael Root, the assistant special agent in charge at the DEA’s Anchorage office. Root emphasized that no one dropping off medications would be the subject of any type of check. “The officers are there simply to collect the drugs,” he said.

Other drug take-back locations will be available in Anchorage, the Fairbanks area and on the Kenai Peninsula. A previous take-back day was held in April.

“We try to provide these programs a couple times a year,” Root said.

Root said statewide, the April event brought in 4,162 pounds, and last fall’s tally was 2,766. Since the program began in 2010, some 25,000 pounds has been collected in the state.

According to the DEA, the country has seen an increase in opiate abuse in recent years, especially painkillers. Some 6.4 million Americans age 12 and over — 2.4 percent of the population — abuse prescription drugs, according to a DEA-cited 2015 National Survey on Drug Use and Health released in September.

“Drug overdoses are now the leading cause of injury-related death in the United States, eclipsing deaths from motor vehicle crashes or firearms,” according to a DEA press release. “The majority of prescription drug abusers report that they obtain their drugs from friends and family, including from the home medicine cabinet.”

The take-back also keeps the medications from potentially entering the environment through landfill or wastewater disposal, according to the DEA.

Liquids, needles and sharps won’t be accepted — only pills and patches. Expired pet medications also will be accepted.

“We decided to really reach out in those pet medications this year because they too can work their way to being used illicitly,” Root said. “Plus, people don’t always know what to do with them.”

The drugs gathered will be incinerated, he said.

Nationally during the 11th take-back event last spring, some 893,498 pounds were collected. Since the program began, that total has reached 6.4 million pounds, according to the DEA.

For more information, visit www.dea.gov, call the Mat-Su Borough at 861-8557 or email mmiller@matsugov.us