What's more hip than "going green?!" Having recently gone through a 1/2 house remodel, it's hard to ignore all the "green" talk when updating your home. Whether you are choosing new flooring or paint color, you suddenly learn all about sustainable materials like bamboo and low VOC paints. And in the process, you have fun discovering the newest alternatives and resources are for making your home safer and "greener."
There is, however, another way to go green which will make your house infinitely safer for your little ones, help our water supply, and is much cheaper than remodeling. In fact, it's free! Simply check your expired medicines and dispose of them properly by taking them to a "Green Pharmacy."
Our water filtration systems, while designed to remove primarily biological human waste, are now susceptible to new pharmaceuticals which are introduced into the marketplace and then "flushed" when no longer used or needed. Unfortunately, this may lead to products in the water which are "overlooked in monitoring studies" according to Dr. Joel Kreisberg in "Pharmaceutical Pollution: Ecology & Toxicology." Consequently, pharmaceuticals are showing up in samples of drinking water - among the most common mentioned in Dr. Kreisberg's article were aspirin, hypertensive medication, and statins.
While making your New Year's resolutions, consider including a quick review and clean-up of your medicine cabinet. "Going green" can really pay off this year!
If you live in the San Francisco Bay Area, here is a list of pharmacies that will take back unwanted and/or expired medications. They even include a checklist of accepted versus not accepted items. In addition, they have a link to a guide which tells you how to dispose of substances that are "unacceptable."
