Fairbanks Police Department to participate in National Drug Take Back Day

FAIRBANKS, Alaska (KTVF) - National Drug Take Back Day is Saturday April 30th. This collaboration between the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) and the Fairbanks Police Department is dedicated to helping residents safely dispose of old prescription medications.

According to Ron Dupee, Chief of Police for the Fairbanks Police Department, the goal of the event is to give residents a safe method to properly get rid of their unused medication. Dupee explained, “We ask the community to bring any expired, unused or unwanted medications to the police department. We provide a safe way for them to dispose of those medications. We box it up, the DEA takes it and they dispose of it properly.”

There are several reasons to properly dispose of old medications. Flushing them down the toilet could contaminate groundwater. Throwing them away could potentially harm animals digging through the garbage.

Dupee elaborated, “But the biggest reason that we ask you to bring your medication and dispose of it properly is we don’t want kids being able to get a hold of it. So once your medication is used for the purposes, if you have anything left over we would advise you to bring it down and dispose of it at an event such as this.”

While the event itself will be taking place on April 30th, according to Dupee there are plenty of opportunities to safely dispose of unused medications year round. Dupee remarked, “Right in the lobby of the Fairbanks police department we have a 24/7 drop box that looks like a big mailbox and in our lobby. So anytime that anybody wants to drop off medication, they’re free to come down to the police department. We’ll let them into the lobby and they can dispose of that medication at any time.”

Copyright 2022 KTVF. All rights reserved.