Campaign launched for Sask. residents to bring in unused medication

Saskatchewan pharmacists want your unused and expired medication.

The Pharmacy Association of Saskatchewan has launched a public awareness campaign to help address the harmful effects of medication misuse.

The province-wide campaign encourages Saskatchewan residents to return all unused and expired medication to a local pharmacy. The Government of Saskatchewan is providing $350,000 toward the program.

That money will be used towards the public awareness campaign through billboards, radio and newspaper ads, and posters, among other things.

“A portion is also going to pharmacists to pay them for collecting the larger amounts. So they’re not reimbursed completely, but it’s a payment to a certain level when they return those,” Pharmacy Association of Saskatchewan CEO Michael Fougere said Wednesday.

The Saskatchewan government is fully on board with the idea.

“We are pleased to support the Pharmacy Association’s efforts to keep Saskatchewan residents safer,” said Everett Hindley, the minister for mental health and addictions, seniors and rural and remote health.

“Developing a provincial safe medication disposal program is an important part of our suicide prevention plan, as removing unused prescription drugs limits access to a means of suicide.”

Across the country, medication return programs have proven to be a safe way of removing expired, unwanted or unused medicines from homes, thereby reducing the opportunity for others to find and intentionally use or accidentally take unused medicine.

“Pharmacists play a vital role in counselling patients on the use of medications, and they are located in more than 125 communities right across the province, so it makes sense that these medications be taken back to pharmacies for safe disposal,” Fougere said.

“Some of these medications in the wrong hands can really cause some very damaging things to happen.”

There will be no financial incentive for people to return their old medication, but Fougere says the association and government shouldn’t have to pay people to do it.

“It’s free and it’s the right thing to do,” he said.

Pharmacists will accept the return of any unused medication. They ask individuals returning medications to scratch out any patient identification on the medication bottles, place all returned medication into a clear plastic bag, and return it to the pharmacy.

Pharmacists will then place the returned medication into special medication disposal boxes, which are safely destroyed on a regular basis.