May 29, 2016 By Luke Campbell 3 min read

It all originated with a personal experience.

As state Rep. John Maher, R-Upper St. Clair, walked into a local pharmacy to dispose of unused prescriptions from a love one who passed away, he quickly realized it couldn’t be done.

Now, nearly a year later, Maher’s persistence with House Bill 1737 to make safe drug disposal an everyday priority is going to the Senate for consideration, after being passed by the House.

The legislation would allow for every place a prescription is disseminated – including hospitals, nursing homes and pharmacies – to also be safe, convenient drug disposal locations.

“I’m not only very excited that this bill has progressed but how the Pennsylvania Medical Society has embraced it,” said Maher. “Time is the enemy. The sooner we can clear out medicine cabinets to eliminate that temptation, the better.”

The other enemy for Maher is the continued growing epidemic of prescription drug abuse across the United States, including the alarming rise in numbers in southwestern Pennsylvania.

Addiction to prescription pills, mainly narcotic painkillers such as oxycodone and hydrocodone, has proved to be more deadly than some illegal drugs.

In a 2013 study by Trust for America’s Health titled Prescription Drug Abuse: Strategies to Stop the Epidemic, Pennsylvania had the 14th-highest drug overdose mortality rate among the 50 states, a rate that increased by 89 percent from 1999 to 2010.

“Without a source to supply it, nobody gets started,” said Maher. “If these drugs are controlled, not only once they are prescribed but after that, making them disappear is what will make folks much less likely to fall victim to that.”

Not only has taking the steps to clear out cabinets been a problem, the process of how people empty them has also been negligent.

Even with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration setting up collection days occasionally throughout the year, many resort to throwing unused drugs in the trash or flushing them down the toilet.

A 2008 Associated Press investigation showed that the disposed drugs have affected at least 46 million Americans.

“With Vicodin, Percocet and Hydrocodone, the risk is that it’s an easy gateway to addiction,” said Maher. “With other prescription medicines that maybe don’t have the attractiveness of an addictive quality, they can be bad for the environment and the water supply.”

According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, a non-profit organization that focuses on health issues and U.S. role in global health policy, out of the nearly 4 billion prescriptions filled in 2015, an estimated one-third of the medication has gone unused.

“In today’s fast-paced world, folks like to accomplish things as quickly as they think of them,” said Maher. “This bill will allow them to do that in their day-to-day activities, rather than people gathering, saving and remembering to do it on those particular days that might not fit their schedule.”