Safe Drug Disposal Act Of 2010

Floor Speech

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Mr. Speaker, I thank my good friend from New Jersey for yielding me the time, as well as his friendship, as well as the distinguished gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Whitfield). And I want to recognize Mr. Inslee for introducing this legislation.

We share a deep concern about the use of medications which are not being safely returned to drug stores because of regulatory difficulties. In many cases, you have to have a police officer there overseeing the return of the drugs.

This will get over those restrictions and allow a process to happen which is terribly important, because we should all know that drug abuse is not limited to street corner illegal drug purchases, that, in fact, the abuse of prescription drugs is a large part of America's drug problem, particularly among young people. One study has shown that, in the last decade, nonmedical use of prescription drugs increased by almost 100 percent; and among adolescents between the ages of 12 and 17, it increased by more than 200 percent.

Too many of our young people are raiding the family medicine cabinet to obtain prescription drugs like OxyContin, Ritalin, and Valium. And, of course, it doesn't just affect those individuals, and it's not harmless. It clearly is leading to an increase in criminal behavior.

We find that about 600,000 emergency department visits over a year involved the nonmedical use of prescription or over-the-counter drugs or dietary supplements. It's a substantial increase year after year. About one-third of the visits result in hospital admissions. In fact, 1,365 of those emergency visits have resulted in the death of the patient, oftentimes young people. And that's where we see the biggest problem--fatalities in children 13 to 19 years of age.

So this will allow local communities to create drug disposal programs. As Mr. Inslee and Mr. Whitfield had mentioned, it gives consumers a safe way to dispose of unneeded pharmaceuticals, including controlled substances. A number of the most responsible pharmacies have asked for this. The pharmacists say they want to be constructive in this process and prevent this illegal and oftentimes fatal use of prescription drugs on the part of young children.

This is a very important piece of legislation. It will save lives. It's the right thing to do.

I just want to mention one other thing that involves our Interior and Environment Appropriations Subcommittee. We are finding that one of the things that is leading to very serious problems with water quality is the fact that prescription medications are winding up in our water supply because our sewage treatment centers don't have the ability to screen them out, so they go right into the water supply that leads to drinking water. And we think that that is a source of some of the problems we find with endocrine-disrupting chemicals that block or mimic natural hormones. And we see that in a number of fish, particularly the fish in the Potomac River. This is one of the problems.

So we are addressing a number of issues with this legislation. I trust that it will be passed unanimously, and maybe even by the Senate, which would be phenomenal. So, Mr. Speaker, we thank all those who cosponsored this, and let's hope it becomes law very quickly.

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