Hey, if you have some unused or expired prescription drugs, the Colts want you to give them your unused or expired prescription drugs:
The Colts want you to give them drugs
And they’ll give you a DVD!
Brian Spurlock-USA TODAY Sports
Bring unused or expired Rx prescriptions for safe disposal to #ColtsCamp on 8/9 & receive the 2014 highlight DVD! http://t.co/1iZAPMg60c
— Indianapolis Colts (@Colts) August 6, 2015 This is part of a program run by the state of Indiana to cut down on prescription drug abuse.
1. So, the main reason this is weird is because the Colts’ owner, Jim Irsay, was arrested and pleaded guilty for driving under the influence of prescription drugs with bottles of drugs in his car.
I genuinely can’t tell whether the person who organized this event for the Colts is doing so with awareness -- “our owner did something he shouldn’t have and this is our way of addressing the larger societal problem of prescription drug abuse” -- or whether this was just incredibly gauche.
Either way, we are talking about Jim Irsay and his drug problems again, and people are making jokes about it:
"I am definitely the Colts and not Jim Irsay tweeting from my team's account." pic.twitter.com/TKB01O8N7E
— Matt Ufford (@mattufford) August 6, 2015 2. We all understand the sell-by date on milk -- soon after it, the milk will start to go bad and smell bad and taste bad and be unhealthy to drink -- but very few of us understand what the expiration date on prescription drugs means. The expiration date on a bottle of prescription pills is legally the last date on which the manufacturer can guarantee full potency. In some cases, this just means the company hasn’t tested it past the expiration date.
If your health depends on the full potency of a drug, you should get it replaced after its expiration date. If you're taking a drug that is known to lose potency very quickly, you should not take it past its expiration date. However, most drugs will not harm you after their expiration date. In fact, most drugs will remain very effective after their listed "expiration date."
A Department of Defense study showed that 88 percent of drugs tested should have their expiration dates extended, and that on average they could be extended by over five years. Last year I saw my dad -- a doctor, and one who is neither suicidal, nor, to the best of my knowledge, considered egregiously bad by his peers -- take a Tylenol that expired in the 1990's. His headache got better.
In many cases, people discarding expired drugs and replacing them with new drugs are throwing away a perfectly usable item and replacing it with an identical item that costs a lot of money. This has nothing to do with the program, which is aimed at convincing people with prescription drug problems to give away their prescription drugs for free, but hey, now you know.
3. You’re asking people to give up drugs that are a) still effective for medical purposes and b) cost a ton of money and the reward you’re going to give them for returning those drugs for free is ...
A 2014 COLTS HIGHLIGHTS DVD?
I can go watch all the highlights of the Indianapolis Colts’ 2014 season on YouTube right now. I also haven’t watched a DVD of any type in several years. Therefore, I conservatively value the worth of a 2014 Colts highlights DVD at zero dollars. If they’d won the Super Bowl or at least the AFC Championship, maybe this would be worth some money. However, the Colts lost in the Divisional Round of the playoffs.
Meanwhile, prescription drugs are expensive as hell. They cost a lot to buy at a pharmacy, they presumably cost even more to purchase illegally. I conservatively value the worth of prescription drugs as a lot of dollars.
If the Colts actually wanted to keep people from taking their perfectly usable drugs and abusing them or selling them to people who will abuse them, they probably should offer more than a freakin’ DVD. Give away some free preseason tickets, at least.
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