What should you do with your prescription drugs, old and current?
In case you haven’t heard, prescription drugs are considered the fastest rising drug abuse threat in our society. This is true from teenagers and young adults all the way through the baby boomer generation.
So where are all of these prescriptions coming from and how are young people getting them?
According to the Partnership for a Drug-Free America, more than three in five teens say prescription pain relievers are easy to get from parents’ medicine cabinets; half of teens say they’re easy to get through other people’s prescriptions; and more than half of teens say pain relievers are “available everywhere;” 43 percent of teens believe pain relievers are cheap and 35 percent believe they are safer to use than illegal drugs.
In addition to that, a street market has developed for many prescriptions, especially painkillers like Vicodin, Oxycontin, Lortab, Methadone, etc… as well as amphetamines like Ritalin, Adderall, and Dexedrine. There have even been incidences where people have robbed pharmacies just for drugs and left all the cash.
Due to the outbreak in prescription drug abuse across the country in recent years, more states have been implementing prescription drug monitoring programs, where pharmacies and doctors share information on who is prescribed what and when, which would cut down on the “doctor shopping” that some addicts do. This is where someone will go to several doctors with the same problem, real or imagined, and get multiple prescriptions for an addictive substance. They then travel around to different pharmacies to have them filled.
Despite the legal drugs becoming illicit, the most common ways for people to start abusing them is by getting them from friends and family members who have been prescribed these drugs.
So, for those of you at home, a good idea is to throw away your old medications and lock up or hide any current ones. People of all ages, but especially teenagers and young adults, are taking these drugs to get high. You could also try an alternative substitute than a narcotic or amphetamine if at all possible, and not run the risk in the first place.
Article by Eric
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So where are all of these prescriptions coming from and how are young people getting them?
According to the Partnership for a Drug-Free America, more than three in five teens say prescription pain relievers are easy to get from parents’ medicine cabinets; half of teens say they’re easy to get through other people’s prescriptions; and more than half of teens say pain relievers are “available everywhere;” 43 percent of teens believe pain relievers are cheap and 35 percent believe they are safer to use than illegal drugs.
In addition to that, a street market has developed for many prescriptions, especially painkillers like Vicodin, Oxycontin, Lortab, Methadone, etc… as well as amphetamines like Ritalin, Adderall, and Dexedrine. There have even been incidences where people have robbed pharmacies just for drugs and left all the cash.
Due to the outbreak in prescription drug abuse across the country in recent years, more states have been implementing prescription drug monitoring programs, where pharmacies and doctors share information on who is prescribed what and when, which would cut down on the “doctor shopping” that some addicts do. This is where someone will go to several doctors with the same problem, real or imagined, and get multiple prescriptions for an addictive substance. They then travel around to different pharmacies to have them filled.
Despite the legal drugs becoming illicit, the most common ways for people to start abusing them is by getting them from friends and family members who have been prescribed these drugs.
So, for those of you at home, a good idea is to throw away your old medications and lock up or hide any current ones. People of all ages, but especially teenagers and young adults, are taking these drugs to get high. You could also try an alternative substitute than a narcotic or amphetamine if at all possible, and not run the risk in the first place.
Article by Eric
Stumble It | Digg It | Furl It | Reddit | Rojo ItBookmark in del.icio.us | Add to technorati faves
Bookmark in Yahoo! | Seed in Newsvine
Add to Google Bookmarks | Add to Bloglines
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