Ohio Officials Announce Opioid Disposal Program To Help Curb Epidemic

(ONN) – Governor Mike DeWine has announced another prong of a new, statewide effort to battle Ohio’s opioid crisis.

The governor teamed up with the Ohio Bureau of Workers’ Compensation to make sure that people who are prescribed opioids for a workplace injury will also get a drug disposal bag.

The bags destroy the opioids in a chemical process so that unused pills cannot be misused.

Pharmacies across the state will begin offering the disposal bags on November 1st to people filling a prescription for opioids.

According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse: in 2017, Ohio had the second highest rate of drug overdose deaths involving opioids in the U.S. when there were nearly 4,300 deaths that year.