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Hernando Today

Finding A Final Resting Place For Old Drugs

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By JOHN HERBERT

Hernando Today

Published: January 7, 2009

A Hernando Today letter writer doesn't think much of the county's feeble attempts to help us dispose of unwanted prescription drugs at the local dump at least a 20-mile drive outside of Brooksville. He's right, but he's only scratched the surface of a major county drug challenge.

The biggest problem is that Hernando County is largely made up of pill-popping seniors who need, say, blood-pressure drugs, cholesterol fighters or heart medicines. These seniors are most likely to accumulate out-of-date or surplus drugs.

They are also the "golden oldies" who are least mobile and that shouldn't be driving anyway. If they do still drive, they don't stray very far from State Road 50 between the gated senior communities of High Point and Brookridge. And now we expect them to climb behind the wheel and drive some 20-40 miles out of town just to get rid of drugs they no longer need or want?

I can hear the toilets in Brookridge and High Point flushing big time.

The overall problem actually extends to just about anything you can find in your bathroom medicine cabinet - including contraceptives, hair sprays, even steroids.

Just the other day, my better half was cleaning out the medicine cabinet and found dusty drugs and dried-up ointments that were both 10 and 15 years out-of-date.

Our gut reaction is to toss any unwanted drugs in the rubbish or to flush them down the toilet. Bad choices: The county's solid waste department may have realized we are facing a disposal challenge but, as the letter writer points out, the "powers-that-be" in Brooksville haven't done all that much to help us out.

We do whatever we can, mixing liquids with coffee grounds (kitty litter will do nicely, too, but we don't have cats any longer), grinding up the left-over pills, and sealing them all in boxes that not even the nosiest wild animal would sniff out in an overturned rubbish barrel. That still leaves us with a pollution problem. All we can hope is that Waste Management's disposal devices will do their best.

Anyone with a leaky septic tank will understand the risks. The grass above and around the septic tank is almost always greener than in the rest of the yard. The crud filters into the water table fast.

Whatever we flush down the toilet- blood thinners, anti-depressants or over-the counter aspirin - will eventually find water. New strains of drug-resistant microbes and bacteria could be created. Fish could become infertile or hermaphroditic; even worse, new species of sea monsters could knock down our doors.

Taking a half-day's expensive drive out in the woods just to dispose of something potentially dangerous is something; but it's far from adequate. We're probably in the habit, sort of, of piling up old cans of paint or expired batteries around the house. We don't know exactly what to do with them; with an occasional newspaper warning, we realize they're both fire and health risks.

Some of us are thoughtful enough to try to return drug surpluses to a local drug store or nursing home where an indigent may be grateful for them. No go. Hernando County drug stores usually don't want totouch them. Even relatively new meds are no use to anybody else once they have left the store.

What we need is not a biannual drug drop-off at the county dump, but a countywide ordinance recommending that all drug stores in our area accept and safely destroy whatever may tumble out of the medicine cabinet. A directive could be incorporated into the permitting process.

If the county won't do it, then encourage the state of Florida adopt a regulation covering surplus drug disposal. At worst, the feds could pass a law with the same end effect. But they'd probably call for a few thousand bureaucrat-inspectors to run the program.

Several European countries already have us beaten by at least a generation in the unwanted drug sweepstakes. All Swedish drug stores, for example,have public-access disposal boxes, picked up at the end of the dayby the drug wholesalerand burned(even liquids are torched).

It doesn't cost the customer a cent, or an öre, as the case may be, even though the disposal boxes cost the Swedish drug stores around $10 each. The drug stores provide customers with free green plastic baggies that can be sealed up.The boxes are also sealed before they are incinerated.

Sweden has just one hitch in its effective drug disposal program. Every drug store in the country is controlled by the same government-owned company. Administration is both easy and consistent. Although government supervised, the system works!

A regular columnist for Hernando Today, John Herbert lives in Spring Hill.

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