NORWICH – The Norwich Police Department collected three 35-gallon containers and two garbage bags full of prescription drugs Saturday as part of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency’s “National Take Back Initiative.”
Police Chief Joseph Angelino said 61 citizens visited the department and dropped off a wide range of prescription narcotics valued well into the thousands of dollars if sold illegally on the street.
“Simply put, the program was a great success for us,” said Angelino.
Police across the country participated in the first-ever national take-back day providing an opportunity for the public to surrender expired, unwanted, or unused pharmaceutical controlled substances to law enforcement for disposal.
Angelino said the Norwich Police collected a large volume of drugs given the area’s population. For instance, the City of Utica Police Department called its initiative a success Monday after having about half as many participants turn over a smaller volume of drugs.
“The DEA provided us with three boxes and we filled all three of them along with two garbage bags,” said Angelino.
Detective Michael Purdy said the department received about 120 pounds of material which was taken by the DEA over the weekend for destruction.
Purdy explained it was difficult to estimate the total worth of the drugs because there was such a diversity of narcotics, but said just one surrendered bottle he noticed Saturday would have been worth over a thousand dollars. He said a number of people tried to hand in syringes and other prohibited materials, but no illegal street drugs were submitted.
“Primarily we had many responsible senior citizens giving us their old medications; they were very enthusiastic about it and wanted to know when we’d be doing this again,” he said. Purdy also said some local agencies took the opportunity to dispose of their old prescription drugs, which added up to about half the collected amount.
Purdy said prescription abuse is one of the largest drug problems facing local youths, noting that national statistics say one in five teens have used a prescription substance for recreation.
“In my opinion it’s a very serious problem for law enforcement in our area,” he added. “That was the aim of this program – to hopefully remove these substances from the public and limit their availability to people who wish to abuse them or profit by their illegal sale,” he said.
Angelino said officers were told that many people disposed of their prescription drugs by flushing them down the toilet, which he explained is harmful to the water supply.
“Water waste treatment facilities are designed to remove organic contaminates only and man-made substances – prescription drugs – are not filtered out. There have been many recent reports nationally of traces of prescription drugs being found in water supplies,” he said.
“The safe disposal of the medications will prevent both landfill and water contamination, prevent abuse of the prescription medications and ensure their proper disposal,” added Purdy.
Participation in this weekend’s program was anonymous and Angelino said police destroyed all labels on the submitted medications before handing them over to the DEA. The chief said the department is looking forward to participating in the program next year.