WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) today announced that, following his urging, the U.S. Department of Justice’s (DOJ) Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) will reinstate its National Take-Back Initiative (NTBI) – a program that sponsors events where Americans can safely dispose of unwanted prescription drugs, reducing the amount of expired or unused prescription drugs for illegal use or prescription drug abuse. At the last DEA-sponsored National Prescription Drug Take-Back Day event, the DEA and more than 4,000 of its partners collected 309 tons of unwanted drugs at nearly 5,500 sites around the country, bringing the total amount of drugs collected in four years to more than 2,400 tons. The next Prescription Drug Take Back Day will be September 26, 2015.

“Abuse of prescription drugs—especially painkillers—can devastate communities. Too many young people can get prescription drugs like OxyContin or Vicodin from family and friends who no longer use the medicine they were legally prescribed,” Brown said. “I worked to reinstate National Prescription Drug Take-Back Day so Ohioans can safely dispose of their unused prescription drugs to prevent them from falling into the wrong hands.”

The DEA’s response to the letter sent by Brown and his Senate colleagues can be found here.

Ohio’s death rate due to unintentional drug poisoning increased 366 percent from 2000 to 2012 and in 2007, unintentional drug poisoning became the leading cause of accidental death in Ohio, surpassing motor vehicle crashes and suicide for the first time on record. Five Ohioans died every day in 2012 from unintentional drug overdoses. Prescription pain medications, such as oxycodone, morphine, and methadone are largely responsible for increasing numbers of overdoses and deaths in Ohio.

Brown continues his fight to help prevent and crack down on drug abuse. Brown is a cosponsor of The Recovery Enhancement for Addiction Treatment (TREAT) Act, bipartisan legislation reintroduced in May to enable more health care providers to treat larger numbers of patients struggling with addiction. Federal law currently limits the capacity for providers to care for patients with opioid abuse problems using medication-assisted treatment.

Brown also cosponsored the Jason Simcakoski Memorial Opioid Safety Act, bipartisan legislation that will help provide safer and more effective pain management services to our nation’s veterans. The legislation focuses on strengthening the VA opioid prescribing guidelines and improving pain management services. The Jason Simcakoski Memorial Opioid Safety Act would also help strengthen patient advocacy, expand access to complementary and integrative health and wellness, and enhance VA hiring and internal audits. The bill is named for U.S. Marine Veteran Jason Simcakoski, who died at a Wisconsin VA facility in August 2013 as a result of mixed drug toxicity.

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