April 28, 2019
By: Dwayne Page
Many people cleaned out their medicine cabinets of unwanted, out of date, or no longer needed prescriptions and brought them to the Smithville and Alexandria city halls for disposal Saturday during the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration’s National Prescription Drug Take-Back Day.
Lisa Cripps, local Coordinator of the DeKalb Prevention Coalition, said 65.2 pounds of prescription drugs and controlled substances were collected for disposal Saturday at Smithville and Alexandria.
“Thank you DeKalb County for another successful drug Take-Back. We had a total of 8.6 pounds of controlled substances and 56.6 pounds of other medications, making our overall take back at 65.2 pounds,” said Cripps.
The event was sponsored by the DeKalb Prevention Coalition and supported by the DeKalb County Health Department, DeKalb County Coordinated School Health, and local law enforcement officers and constables.
“Take-Back Days in April and October each year are a safe and easy way to protect your loved ones and to get these drugs out of your home,” added Cripps.
“The reason we do this is because we have found when we work with recovery groups is that a lot of their abuse of medications started from them taking it out of their grandparents’ house or their own medicine cabinets,” said Cripps.
“We advocate Count It, Lock It, Drop It. Count your medications and keep them locked up. Today in Smithville and Alexandria we gave away lock boxes and you can come by the coalition office at the county complex and pick one up. They are free. You can lock up your medications in these lock boxes,” added Cripps.
“Remember that if your medications are unused, out of date or unwanted you can drop them off in one of our local drop boxes. If you missed Saturday’s take-back event, the county has drop boxes at the City Hall in Alexandria and City Hall in Smithville that are open Monday through Friday each week”.
“We thank the people of Alexandria. The city has allowed us to set up here at city hall and the police department has been a great help to us today to monitor this. We also want to thank our health department for partnering with us because they handle all the medications. As the DeKalb Prevention Coalition Coordinator I hand out the surveys and the lock boxes. Thanks to the DeKalb County Coordinated School Health program. Coordinator Elise Driver provided a healthy snack of fresh berries this year to the participants. Thanks to all of our participants. We’ll see you again in October,” said Cripps