Drug Take Back Day Coming Up Saturday

Law enforcement officers at locations across the state will be collecting unused medications for safe disposal on Saturday.

“It is a responsibility to have control of something that the law says is not supposed to just be generally distributed,” said Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt. “I think that really means that we take on some amount of obligation to make sure that we dispose of it properly, either by using it or by destroying it after it’s no longer needed.”

Since the Drug Take-Back Day program began in 2010, more than 81 tons of unwanted medications have been collected and destroyed in Kansas alone.

“It’s an opportunity for people to clean out those medicine cabinets and safely, free, securely, privately, ensure that those medications are safely destroyed, so they don’t get misused,” said Schmidt.

The National Drug Take-Back Day is coordinated by the federal Drug Enforcement Administration, which collects and safely destroys the medications.

“It’s just a matter of life happens and things get disorganized,” said Schmidt. “Sometimes, it’s because we got medicines when we didn’t feel well and so we’re not at our most crisp in terms of the details of putting things away and all that. For whatever reason, it’s worth the search and worth taking care of.”

Medications will be accepted at drop-off sites across the state from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturday. To find a location, visit www.ag.ks.gov.