Clean out your medicine cabinet to fight drug-overdose deaths
Acting Drug Enforcement Administration Chief Chuck Rosenberg said that the most shocking thing he has learned was that 120 people die a day from drug overdoses, 43,000 a year. He is asking us to clean out our medicine cabinets.
Too many people get hooked on “prescribed” painkillers. After a hip replacement, the Veterans Affairs gave me a bottle of heavy-duty pain killers with 50 tablets. I was told I could get 100 to 150 more when those were gone. I only needed two when I got home from the hospital and a couple of Advil for four days. I can’t imagine anyone needing more than 20 to 40.
I know others who either took the full dosage or only a few. Many addicts started out with legal drugs and then needed illegal drugs to get by. It’s better to deal with pain that you can handle than addiction that you can’t handle.
Cleaning out your medicine cabinet can keep teens from using them, or sharing or selling them to their friends. About 43,000 deaths a year, tens of thousands suffering, more crime, more family violence. This fight we need to win.
Steven DeLuca, Clovis
This story was originally published July 21, 2015 at 8:11 AM with the headline "Clean out your medicine cabinet to fight drug-overdose deaths."