Happy National Clean Out Your Medicine Cabinet Day! This day occurs annually on the third Friday in April.
The day aims to raise awareness and effectively rid homes of unused or expired prescription and over-the-counter medications sitting in medicine cabinets, nightstands, or kitchen cabinets that have the potential for diversion or abuse by family members, friends or visitors to your home.
Many medicine cabinets are ticking time-bombs. You never know which drug, when it will happen or who might be affected. You can do your part to dispose of those leftover and unused medications that can lead to misuse, addiction, poisoning or death.
Today, the country is in a pitched battle in the war against opioid addiction. Seventy percent of opioid dependence, overdoses, and deaths begin with unused drugs in the medicine cabinet.
It’s a startling statistic speaking directly to the danger of leftover, unused pain prescriptions. But, opioids are just one of the dangerous drugs found lying around our homes.
Others, such as antidepressants, muscle-relaxers, ADHD medications, and sleep aids remaining in medicine cabinets may result in misuse, diversion, poisoning, abuse, and death. Additionally, some expired medications may become toxic.
For instance, studies indicate the commonly prescribed drug tetracycline may degrade to the point of becoming toxic to the kidneys.
How to Do it Right
How you dispose of your expired or unused medications is just as important as why.
Environmental studies show that flushed medications flow into our water supply. They negatively impact the fish we eat and the water we drink. When discarded in the trash, medications leach into and contaminate the soil.
Site-of-use or at-home drug disposal solutions offer a safe, effective, and eco-friendly way of ridding your home of medications we no longer need or have expired.
As a supplement to site-of-use drug disposal on April 19, you may also consider participating in the Drug Enforcement Agency’s (DEA’s) National Drug Takeback Day each year in late April. (Cancelled for 2020 due to COVID-19 crisis).
HOW TO OBSERVE
Take time during National Clean Out Your Medicine Cabinet Day to make your home safe and do your part to help fight drug addiction. Review medications wherever you keep them – in your medicine cabinet, nightstand, or kitchen cabinets, for example.
Afterwards, safely dispose of leftovers from any surgery or illness or those that have expired. You can safely, effectively and easily dispose of these medications by using a site-of-use, in-home disposal solution available online. You can see for yourself how easy and safe it can be.
Social distancing of at least six feet offers us the free time to participate in #CleanOutMedsDay effectively as well. Take advantage of the extra time to go through those medications and prepare them for proper disposal. You’ll be glad you did.
Use #CleanOutMedsDay to share on social media.
HISTORY
In 2019, DisposeRx® founded National Clean Out Your Medicine Cabinet Day to raise awareness of the risks associated with keeping leftover or expired prescription or over the counter medications in your home.
Drug addiction, overdose, poisonings, and deaths related to leftover medications are real. So is the contamination of our environment from flushing medications or putting them in the trash.
DisposeRx provides a safe and effective way to dispose of expired and unused medications that is easy to use and eco-friendly.
The Registrar at National Day Calendar® proclaimed National Clean
Out Your Medicine Cabinet Day be observed annually on the third Friday in April.
DATES
April 16, 2021
April 15, 2022
April 21, 2023
April 19, 2024
April 18, 2025
April 17, 2026
April 16, 2027
April 21, 2028
April 20, 2029
April 19, 2030
April 15, 2022
April 21, 2023
April 19, 2024
April 18, 2025
April 17, 2026
April 16, 2027
April 21, 2028
April 20, 2029
April 19, 2030
About DisposeRx
The mission of DisposeRx® is to eradicate the misuse of unused medications and educate communities about the importance of effectively and safely removing unused and expired drugs from America’s medicine cabinets.
Whether the problem is reducing the potential for misuse or diversion, prevention of accidental poisoning, or the dangers resulting from taking expired medications, understanding the need for safe drug disposal is the first step in proactively solving these problems.
As part of the commitment of DisposeRx® to educating the public about the dangers posed by leftover medications, National Day Calendar® sponsors the groundbreaking podcast series Opioids: Hidden Dangers, New Hope by visiting the website below.
This program features in-depth interviews with those on the frontlines of the opioid crisis – from the professionals in healthcare, counseling, and government to the families whose lives have been irreparably changed due to this scourge.
And just as important as proactively and safely eliminating unused and expired medications from our homes, our site-of-use drug disposal method helps address the growing environmental impact caused by improper medication disposal.
You can see a simple demonstration video of how it works below:
#CleanOutMedsDay
@DisposeRx
@addictionpolicy
@nichecinema
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