I-DROP Prescription Medication Reuse

Prescriptions are expensive; this isn’t news. But did you know that 1/3 of all prescription medications are unused each year? What a cost to society! But the cost of the medication is just part of the cost.

Most people destroy unused medications, whether because they expire or are no longer needed, by throwing them in the trash or flushing down the toilet. That trash ends up in a land fill where rain can cause the medication to dissolve and infiltrate the water table. Medication in the waste system isn’t removed by water reclamation plants like Rockford’s Four Rivers Sanitation Authority (FRSA). Imagine what medications have crept into our water supply! Fish have reproductive and growth problems; what effects are we humans experiencing?

HB119, The Illinois Drug Reuse Opportunity Program Act, passed both houses of our General Assembly on June 1, 2021; Governor Pritzker signed it into law on August 16th; and the law goes into effect on January 1, 2022. We can thank Elizabeth Lindquist, a pharmacist at Swedish American, for her persistence in enacting this bill.

This law allows, for the first time in Illinois, the donation of unused unit-dose prescription medications (drugs in individual blisters) to a doctor or licensed pharmacy which will distribute drugs to low-income, or indigent patients at no cost. These donated drugs cannot be resold. Forty states currently have laws allowing this type of reuse.

Some drugs cannot be donated, including some cancer drugs, controlled drugs, expired drugs and opened containers.

This law will improve the water quality of all of our citizens and improve the health of low-income citizens.

For more details about this program, go to https://www.ilrxdrugrepository.org/