Drug disposal is available throughout the year

While the Drug Enforcement Administration's National Prescription Drug Take Back Day, conducted twice annually, allows for temporary locations for the public to unload unwanted or unnecessary medications and to learn about the dangers of having them, Fostoria-area residents have a pair of drop-off spots in the city that are always available. ProMedica Fostoria Community Hospital, 501 Van Buren St., and the Fostoria Police Division, 213 S. Main St., are open all day, every day and so are the availability of the containers, located immediately inside the entryways to the buildings. With both the hospital and the police station licensed by the DEA as "collectors" of unused drugs, they do not formally participate in the takeback days, which are April 22 and Oct. 29 in 2023. But they heartily endorse them as reinforcement of the services they provide every day. "Those two days really just encourage individuals to go through their meds and to bring awareness to the importance of properly disposing of medications," said Ryann Holsinger, manager of the pharmacy at ProMedica Fostoria Community Hospital. A "MedSafe" drop-off box is located to the left as a person walks into the main entrance of the hospital. The METRICH Drug Task Force has a box immediately to the right as someone enters the police division through the door located off Tiffin Street. Both places have had their receptacles in place since 2018. Fostoria Police Chief Gabe Wedge likes the convenience to the public provided by the box at the station. "We are operating every day of the year; you can bring your pills in here and dispose of them," he said. "We want to have that because everybody's schedules are different; people come up at different times. We do see a lot of people come up and say they had someone in the family pass away who had a lot of pills and they didn't know what to do with them. It's kind of nice to be able to have a place for them, to explain to them how to take care of it and to get rid of the drugs for them. It makes it easier for them and they can do it when it's convenient for them." It certainly makes sense to get rid of unwanted, unused or expired pills for the safety of children or others. But, Wedge said, exposed pills inside may also lead to trouble originating outside in the form of break-ins, feeding addictions or sales on the streets. "Unfortunately, that is one of the major things when burglaries happen," he said. "That's one of the things they're looking for -- prescription pills. We see it time and time again. Getting them out of the house, out of view, can save that whole process from happening. We find out a lot of times the person who broke into a house knew they were there and they were just coming back for them. Usually, it's someone who's been in the house who comes in to do that. We probably see that more than just a random break-in." Said Fostoria Police Det. Brandon Bell, coordinator of the METRICH task force: "I've learned throughout my career that addiction is so strong that people didn't become addicted because they wanted to become addicted; they became addicted because they got hooked on pain pills or something like that, from a legitimate injury. Once they're addicted, that addiction is so strong that even when they want to stop, their bodies physically need that drug and if they don't get it, they get sick. And no one wants to go through withdrawals because sometimes those are worse than the drugs themselves." Harm can also spread unnecessarily through the improper disposal of pills. While authorities formerly considered it acceptable to flush pills down the toilet, they now recognize that "a lot of the wastewater treatment plants don't have the ability to isolate those drugs and get them out of the water," said Randy Koch, south region pharmacy director for ProMedica. "So, all of those medications that are flushed dissolve in the water and they get passed on." The pills collected by the hospital and the police division eventually are incinerated. And unused medications from the hospital itself don't even make it out without being treated. "In the hospital, we use what is called a cactus sink," Koch said. "Because we're not supposed to put the hospital's medications in the MedSafe, we put them into a receptacle that has a resin inside of it that absorbs a drug and makes it unusable or unretrievable within 12 minutes, I believe." Since their installations in 2018, the MedSafe boxes at the hospitals in Fostoria and Fremont, combined, have helped get about a ton of unused meds out of the communities. "That's 2,000 pounds that maybe, had it not been for the MedSafe boxes, could have ended up being flushed or ended up in the wrong hands." The box at the police station also collects a significant haul. "Every year, we have at least 60 pounds from that box alone," said Bell, noting that he has removed as many as 110 pounds of discarded drugs during the course of a year. "I think when we first put the box in, a lot of people didn't know about it," Bell said. "Then, once we started getting the word out on our Facebook page, as well as Drug Take Back Day, people really started to use it."