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Crime & Safety

DEA's 'Take Back' Operation Coming to Fort Lee

The program offers residents the opportunity to anonymously turn in unused prescription drugs.

The DEA will bring “Operation Take Back” to Fort Lee on Saturday for the sixth time in three years.

Residents will have the opportunity to anonymously turn in unused prescription drugs, which both the federal agency and local police encourage as a way to prevent the accidental overdoses and abuse of potentially caused by dated prescriptions left in home medicine cabinets.

“The more medicine we get that isn’t being used, the less likely it is to end up on the street,” police chief Keith Bendul said.

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He added that disposing of medication by flushing it down the toilet or throwing it in the garbage poses its own public safety and environmental hazards, and that the best way to rid the house of unused prescriptions is through this regular program that turns them over to the DEA for destruction.

In its previous five nationwide Take Back events, the DEA has disposed of over two million pounds of unused prescription pills in conjunction with over five thousand local law enforcement agencies nationwide.

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“We’re encouraging our residents to bring in medication that isn’t being used and dispose of it properly,” Bendul said.

The event will run at the Fort Lee Police Station from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday, April 27.

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