Covanta honored for drug take-back efforts

Covanta, Morristown, New Jersey, has been recognized by the Commerce and Industry Association of New Jersey (CIANJ) and its flagship publication, Commerce Magazine, for its achievements in environmental leadership, the company announced. Covanta was honored in the Recycling and Pollution Prevention Program category for its Rx4Safety program.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 130 Americans on average die each day from an opioid overdose. Launched in 2010, Covanta’s Rx4Safety program seeks to address this urgent crisis by providing the means for safe, secure and anonymous disposal of prescription medications through participation in community-sponsored, drug take-back events. Rx4Safety ensures medications collected at these events are properly disposed of so that they do not end up in public waterways and drinking water. Since the program’s inception, Covanta has collected nearly 500,000 pounds of medication in New Jersey alone.

“Covanta is dedicated to serving the communities in which our employees live and work,” Paul Stauder, president of Covanta Environmental Solutions, says. “The Rx4Safety program was born out of this desire [to support] communities with environmentally sound destruction of unwanted medications. Now, almost 10 years later, the demand for this service is greater than ever as people become more aware of the urgent need to protect water resources and keep drugs from falling into the wrong hands. We greatly appreciate this recognition of the program’s impact.”

The amount of unused medications collected during national take-back days continues to grow every year. To meet the increasing demand for safe, secure and convenient medication disposal, Covanta has expanded its offerings to include kiosk and mail-back envelope services at retail pharmacies and other community health care locations across the country. For more information visit www.covanta.com/healthcare-solutions.