Pharmaceutical drop off day

By FRITZ MAYER

MONTICELLO, NY — Once a month, Bill Cutler, the Sullivan County recycling coordinator, speaks at a committee meeting at the government center to inform elected lawmakers how the county’s recycling efforts are going. On October 8, he also took the opportunity to announce the county’s first pharmaceutical drop-off day.

Actually, it’s a statewide effort, initiated by the New York Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC), and residents who want to take advantage of it will have to find a way to get their leftover and unwanted drugs to New Paltz. But it represents an initial attempt by the DEC to deal with the growing environmental and health threat of large amounts of drugs in the nation’s waterways.

In the past, according to the DEC website, the recommended way to get rid of unused drugs was to flush them down the toilet. But not anymore: the practice has led to an alarming amount of pharmaceutical materials in lakes and rivers.

Now, there are so many drugs in the water that the physiology and behavior of fish and other aquatic animals have been changed. Male fish, for example, have been feminized, meaning that they produce eggs when exposed to low levels of hormones from birth-control pills.

The DEC also warns that long-term low level of antibiotics might result in the evolution of drug-resistant microbes and bacteria.

The pharmaceuticals drop-off will take place on October 20 from 8:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. at 21 South Putt Corners Road in New Paltz. For more information call Terry Laibach at 845/256-3141.

A similar drop-off in Lewiston, NY on September 30 resulted in the collection of 800 pounds of old drugs and medicines, including 35 pounds of drugs that were classified as controlled substances.

Household hazardous waste

Meanwhile, the household hazardous waste program in Sullivan County recently completed the ninth annual collection event on September 12. Cutler told lawmakers that 48 families participated and that they recycled such things as mercury, oil-based paints, fluorescent bulbs, car batteries and, according to the county’s website, “one very old test tube, which apparently contained regent-grade arsenic.”

Overall, 4.42 tons of household hazardous waste was collected.