Prescription

drug 

collection

nets 120

pounds

By Linda Lemmon

Town Crier Editor

The work continues in making the community safer from drugs, including prescription drugs.

Romeo Blackmar, coordinator of the Putnam PRIDE, called the 15th overall Prescription Drug Take Back event Oct. 28 a success.

"Anything that we can do to help stop the misuse of prescription medications is a plus for the entire community," he said. "Our efforts to collect unused, unwanted and expired medications has been tremendously successful, in that we are providing a public service to the community for safe disposal of possibly lethal medications.," he added.

It is the eighth fall version of the drug collection and took place at the Farmers Market parking lot.

He said that about 120 pounds were collected at this Take Back event. He added that even with lock boxes installed at most police stations and the State Police barracks, the Putnam collection never drops below 100 pounds.

The Putnam Police Department's lock box, located in the lobby of the police station on Church Street, is averaging 35 to 40 pounds every four to six weeks, according to Deputy Chief Lee Konicki. That works out to 400 to 500 pounds a year.

Blackmar said that once the drugs are collected they are brought to a central collection point by a member of the Statewide Drug Task Force ( a police officer from another local department who is assigned to work with the Task Force) and incinerated at the Lisbon Incinerator.  The drugs collected at the lock box at the Putnam Police Department are also incinerated  in Lisbon.

Since every State Police barracks and other local communities have put in Prescription Lock Boxes in their police departments, Blackmar said, the amounts collected have leveled off a bit for Putnam.  

"We need to keep educating the public that proper disposal of unwanted medications can and does save lives," said Blackmar