June 26th, 2013 by Irene Miles
Recent research has shown that pharmaceuticals and personal care products can cause significant problems for waterways, affecting not only water quality but also negatively impacting the processes that plants and animals need to survive and thrive.
One way that those products are causing pollution in the Great Lakes may not just be due to the chemicals they are made from, though.
From Scientific American:
“Rather, small plastic beads, known as micro plastic, are the offenders, according to survey results to be published this summer in Marine Pollution Bulletin. ‘The highest counts were in the micro plastic category, less than a millimeter in diameter,’ explained chemist Sherri ‘Sam’ Mason of the State University of New York at Fredonia, who led the Great Lakes plastic pollution survey last July. ‘Under the scanning electron microscope, many of the particles we found were perfectly spherical plastic balls.’
Cosmetics manufacturers use these micro beads, or micro exfoliates, as abrasives in facial and body scrubs. They are too tiny for water treatment plants to filter, so they wash down the drain and into the Great Lakes. The biggest worry: fish such as yellow perch or turtles and seagulls think of them as dinner. If fish or birds eat the inert beads, the material can deprive them of nutrients from real food or get lodged in their stomachs or intestines, blocking digestive systems.”
These latest findings help provide additional information on how these common products can cause environmental problems. For more information, read the complete article at the link above and visit our Unwanted Meds website.
May 30th, 2013 by Irene Miles
IISG staffers will join hundreds of scientists, environmentalists, and government representatives June 2-6 at the Conference on Great Lakes Research. Spread across each day of the conference, their presentations will cover vital work on Sea Grant education initiatives, new tools that help officials protect aquatic ecosystems in the Great Lakes region, and more.
Robin Goettel and Terri Hallesy will kick things off Tuesday morning with a close look at education strategies that improve Great Lakes literacy. Later in the session, Caitie McCoy will discuss a program piloted last year at two schools near the Grand Calumet River. The program was designed to teach students living in Areas of Concern about the science behind restoration projects. Attendees will also hear from Terri and others about Undo the Chemical Brew, a project that has collected 2.7 million unwanted pharmaceutical pills for safe disposal since 2010.
On Wednesday, members of the AIS outreach team will talk about resources they’ve developed to help water gardeners avoid invasive plants that are likely to spread in the Great Lakes. The resources are part of a larger effort to develop and implement risk assessment tools that can be used by resource managers and policy-makers to determine which commercially-sold aquatic species pose the greatest threat to the region.
IISG members will also be a part of several presentations on Wednesday and Thursday about environmental indicators communities can use to make sustainable land-use decisions. During the session, Brian Miller, Kristin TePas, and Marty Jaffe will introduce two web-based tools that help officials understand land use impacts on local aquatic environments and take steps towards securing the long-term health of the region’s natural resources.
The International Association for Great Lakes Research’s (IAGLR) 56th Annual Conference on Great Lakes Research is sponsored by IISG and Purdue University. To view the entire program, visit the conference website.
May 2nd, 2013 by Irene Miles
Illinois and Indiana residents took full advantage of the latest national prescription drug take back event this past Saturday, bringing unwanted pharmaceuticals and over-the-counter medicines to locations set up for the one-day event. IISG staffers were again involved, promoting it through local radio and TV interviews and talking to visitors at Walgreens stores in Champaign and Urbana about the risks pharmaceuticals pose to aquatic environments. They also provided information about how to safely dispose of medicine between these national take-back opportunities.
By the end of the 4-hour event, officials in Champaign and Urbana had collected 12 large boxes of unused medicine. These and other boxes collected throughout the country will be properly incinerated by the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). A final tally for how many pounds of pharmaceuticals were collected during the sixth National Take-Back Day will be announced by the DEA in the coming weeks. At last September’s event, Illinois residents brought in over 21,000 pounds of unwanted medicine for proper disposal, followed closely by Indiana’s 18,560 pounds. More than 2 million pounds of medicine have been disposed of nation-wide since the take-back days began in 2010.
IISG volunteers were also onsite to tell residents of the two cities about a new year-round collection program launching May 24. Like last year, many who brought in pharmaceuticals – often by the bagful – said they had been holding onto their medications for months, waiting for the next collection day. Permanent collection boxes at the Champaign, Urbana, and University of Illinois police departments mean residents will no longer have to wait for single-day events like these to rid their homes of unwanted pharmaceuticals.
To learn more about permanent programs operating in your area, or for information on how to dispose of medicine where collections are not available, visit www.unwantedmeds.org.
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April 23rd, 2013 by Irene Miles
IISG science writer Anjanette Riley was in attendance at the University of Illinois’ Student Health Fair April 17 and sent in this post about the event.
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At a booth in the heart of the Student Health Fair held yesterday at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, one important question could be heard throughout the day: If I shouldn’t flush them down the toilet, what am I supposed to do with my unused medications?
IISG’s Laura Kammin and Corrie Maxwell Layfield were there to communicate the importance of properly disposing of medicines. During the one-day event, Laura and Corrie talked with more than 130 people about the health and environmental risks posed by pharmaceutical pollution and how they could safely dispose of unwanted medicines. Visitors were also told about the nationwide medicine takeback event coming up on April 27 where they could drop off human and pet medications at locations throughout Illinois.
Amid the buzz and bustle of the crowded fair, many students lingered at IISG’s booth with additional questions about research on the effects of pharmaceuticals in water and locations of permanent collection programs. Most were surprised to learn that pharmaceutical chemicals have been found in lakes and rivers and linked with changes in wildlife behavior and health. Those who had heard of the dangers of flushing unwanted medication were also surprised to hear that pills thrown in the trash could leach into ground water or find their way to wastewater treatment plants.
But despite how much they knew about proper pharmaceutical disposal when they stopped at the booth, many left promising not to not to flush or throw away their medication in the future.
“People get the “Don’t Flush” message,” said Kammin. “But it isn’t common knowledge yet that putting our unwanted meds in the trash just delays their trip to local water supplies. These students really got that message.”
Laura and Corrie also talked with university professors and fellow exhibitors interested in spreading the word about proper disposal. One professor wanted to incorporate pharmaceutical pollution into a class on environmental hazards. And exhibitors from health clinics and advocacy groups took IISG materials with information on collection programs and what to do when a program is not available to share with their patients and clients.
Learn more about properly disposing of unwanted medicines at our UnwantedMeds.org site, and for more information about the Drug Enforcement Administration’s National Prescription Drug Take-Back Day on April 27 including a list of locations, visit the DEA event website.
March 8th, 2013 by Irene Miles
Last month, representatives from eight Sea Grant programs attended a two-day workshop in Jacksonville, FL hosted by Illinois-Indiana Sea Grant. Designed as an opportunity for specialists, educators, and communicators to build a national partnership on reducing pharmaceuticals and personal care products (PPCPs) in the nation’s waterways, the event was a first step in working towards coordinating these efforts.
Funded by the NOAA National Sea Grant Office, the workshop brought together a wide range of input from people who have extensive experience working on the issue of PPCPs in waterways, allowing for a tremendous collaboration.
Out of the two-day workshop came a unified message: The ways people choose to use and dispose of PPCPs impacts water quality everywhere.
In months to come, workshop participants will continue to work together to develop programs that carry that message to local communities.
“This is a national problem that requires local action. Sea Grant’s new working group is well-suited to tackle this issue because each program is trusted in their communities,” said Laura Kammin, IISG pollution prevention program specialist. “We are sharing our resources to create a strong and effective national partnership.”
The meeting also provided an opportunity for representatives from New York, Pennsylvania, and Illinois-Indiana Sea Grant programs to mentor others by sharing their award-winning work on reducing PPCPs in the Great Lakes basin. These and other discussions opened the door for collaboration with the North Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Oregon, and Southern California Sea Grant programs.
IISG has been providing communities with information about how to start safe, legal medicine collection programs since 2006. So far, IISG has helped 63 communities in Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin and Michigan with single-day or permanent collection programs, ensuring the proper disposal of 9.65 million pills (81,813 pounds of unused medication).
For more information on IISG’s efforts to spread the word about proper use and disposal of PPCPs visit www.unwantedmeds.org.
January 29th, 2013 by Irene Miles
The Drug Enforcement Administration has published proposed regulations regarding the proper disposal of prescription pharmaceuticals and other controlled substances.
From the DEA’s release:
“This rule proposes requirements to govern the secure disposal of controlled substance medications by both DEA registrants and what the Controlled Substances Act refers to as “ultimate users” of these medications (patients and animals). The proposed regulations seek to expand the options available to collect these medications from ultimate users for the purpose of disposal, to include take-back events, mail-back programs, and collection box locations.”
The public comment period is open until February 19, and people can review the entire proposal online here.
For more information about why proper disposal of these substances is so important, visit our Unwanted Meds website.
January 18th, 2013 by Irene Miles
The National Prescription Pill and Drug Disposal program (P2D2) has had a great deal of success lately. After placing third in the international Volvo Adventure Award competition, the program partnered with the second place winners of the Volvo competition to start a P2D2 program in Erechim, Brazil. The P2D2 program began in 2008 as a collaborative effort between local pharmacies, law enforcement agencies, officials, and Pontiac Township High School students in Paul Ritter’s Ecology class and Eric Bohm’s Illinois Studies class.
The P2D2 program’s mission is to educate the public about the harm done to the environment due to current drug disposal practices and to provide communities with an alternative disposal approach that ensures the quality of water for future generations. Their good idea has quickly caught on; the P2D2 program is now available in more than 54 counties in Illinois, 21 other states, and now goes international with the addition of the Brazil P2D2 program coordinated by Paul Hubner.
January 3rd, 2013 by Irene Miles
The University of Illinois’ Learning in Community (LINC) program provides service-learning opportunities for students to gain hands-on experience in a variety of fields while earning course credit towards their degree. The program also gives various departments and units at the University a chance to expand their mission and get students involved in critical issues. This past fall term, the LINC Program offered a Sea Grant-focused course for eight University of Illinois students where they learned about environmental threats to local and regional waterways. They designed and executed projects based on what they had learned about proper disposal of unwanted medicines.
At the conclusion of the course, students developed five activities focused on water issues, informing a larger audience about their importance and local impacts.
The projects included:
– A presentation and activity for Urbana High School’s science club students
– An article in the Green Observer and accompanying Facebook page about the importance of proper disposal of pharmaceuticals
– Placement of brochures at the McKinley Health Center in coordination with the Directors of Health Education and the Pharmacy
– A plan to spread the message about proper medicine disposal at student dormitories and to involve students in medicine collection events in 2013
The course and projects that resulted informed current University of Illinois students about important environmental issues, while giving them experience collaborating with each other, working with local organizations and businesses, and performing outreach to share the information they learned with residents of Champaign-Urbana.
October 2nd, 2012 by Irene Miles
Thousands of residents in Illinois and Indiana came out last Saturday with the goal of ridding their homes of unwanted pharmaceuticals as part of the Drug Enforcement Administration’s (DEA) 5th annual National Prescription Drug Take-Back Day. From 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. police officers and volunteers in more than 200 locations in Illinois and 70 in Indiana collected bottles, boxes, and sometimes even garbage bags full of prescription and over-the-counter human and veterinary medications. Everything collected will be properly incinerated by the DEA.
IISG staffers were at two of these locations at Walgreens stores in Champaign and Urbana, joining local police officers and Walgreens representatives to collect medication, answer questions about the environmental effects of throwing away or flushing pharmaceuticals, and provide information on how to safely dispose of medications when collection events are not available.
At both locations, people began lining up to hand over their medicine even before the event began. IISG volunteers heard from several people that they had been saving medications in anticipation of Saturday’s event. Take-back event regulars brought medications accumulated just since April’s DEA-sponsored event, but some brought pharmaceuticals with much older time stamps. One woman disposed of medicine she had been storing in her cabinet since 2005, and another brought in medication that was almost 20 years old. Exact figures on how many pounds of pharmaceuticals were collected during the 4-hour event won’t be announced by the DEA for several weeks, but police officers involved in the event described the day as on track to exceed previous take-back events.
Single-day collection events like this are an important way to limit negative impacts to wildlife and local waterways from prescriptions and medications that are improperly disposed of. A wide-range of pharmaceutical chemicals has been found in rivers, groundwater, and drinking water throughout the country due to medications being flushed down the toilet or thrown in the trash. The impact of these chemicals on long-term human health is still unknown, but a connection between pharmaceutical-contaminated waters and impaired development, behavior, and reproduction has been found in many species of fish and other aquatic wildlife.
Ridding homes of unused medication can also help protect the elderly, children, and pets from accidental poisonings and reduce instances of prescription or over-the-counter drug abuse.
IISG has been educating people on pharmaceutical stewardship issues and helping communities establish safe and legal permanent medicine collection programs for more than six years. For additional information on how to dispose of medicine between take-back events or in areas where collections are not available, visit www.unwantedmeds.org.
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