By Beth Bengtson

Post script: With all the “global weirding” events in the last week on the East Coast (Earthquake and Hurricane) we feel this discussion is even more needed and timely.

My journey on this topic started with a visit to my local pharmacy chain, Rite Aid, which started a TakeAway^TM program in March 2011 to BUY bags for unused and unneeded medications.  An individual bag is $3.99 and taking original packaging into consideration it didn’t take much to fill it up (I ended up needing 5 bags for all of my leftover prescriptions).  With consumer concern over the cost of medications to begin with, this solution is not exactly cheap.  The bags also only take drugs, which left me with the issue of unused applicators, syringes in this case, of which Rite Aid couldn’t help (ways to donate/dispose of those will be a future post once we figure it out).  Lastly, it was the first time the pharmacy counter staff had rung one up and it was obvious (they were quite confused at the protocol).

Point made – this is not easy, this is not cheap, and there is no incentive to not simply flush the products down the toilet, contributing to the problem.  This leaves open the question of what could/should be done here:

• Should the manufacturer be responsible? If not, who?
• What position do manufacturers take on this issue: do they have Take Back programs and, if so, why don’t we know about them?
• What are the avenues available for consumers to safely dispose of outdated medications and medical waste?  Are we making it easy and affordable for people to do the right thing?

This could be a great marketing and reputation issue for the company/brand willing to address it.  It could be a nice bridge to improving the image of the industry as well as solving an evolving environmental issue.

This will be the start of a series exploring the issues and opportunities surrounding the how health and sustainable practices are inextricably linked.  As always, we are interested in your thoughts.