March 28, 2024

Rid Your Home of Dangerous Drugs

Drugs

The St. Mary’s County Sheriff’s Office provides the public an opportunity to prevent prescription abuse and theft by ridding their homes of potentially dangerous expired, unused, and unwanted prescription drugs.

Medications can be taken to the St. Mary’s County Sheriff’s Office headquarters at 23150 Leonard Hall Drive in Leonardtown.

The service is free and anonymous, and the medication drop-boxes are located in the lobby of the sheriff’s office. The drop-boxes are available for medication disposal, not just on National Prescription Take Back Day held each year in April, but every day and are accessible 24 hours a day, to include a sharps container for needle collection.

In past years, St. Mary’s County residents have turned in nearly 1.5 million prescription pills at multiple community events and sites operated by the sheriff’s office. Nationally, previous Take Back events, sponsored by the US Department of Justice’s Drug Enforcement Administration and its partners have taken in over 8.1 million pounds of disposed medication.

The initiative addresses a vital public health and safety issue.

Medicines that languish in home cabinets are highly susceptible to diversion, misuse, and abuse. Rates of prescription drug abuse are alarmingly high, as are the number of accidental poisonings and overdoses due to these drugs. Studies show that a majority of abused prescription drugs are obtained from family and friends, including from the home medicine cabinet.

UPCOMING EVENT: There is a chance to dispose of unused, unwanted, or expired medications safely at the Community Shred & Medication Take Back Day to be held from 9 am to 1 pm Saturday, May 15, 2021, at the Department of Aging & Human Services at 41780 Baldridge St. in Leonardtown.

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