More than 80 locations around New Mexico are participating in the Drug Enforcement Agency's National Take Back Day.
The public is being encouraged on Saturday to drop off expired, unwanted or unused prescription medications so they can be destroyed. The drop-off locations include law enforcement offices.
State police offices from Albuquerque and Santa Fe to Las Cruces, Roswell, Gallup and Farmington are among those participating. Each office will have an officer available to take possession of the unwanted medications.
The DEA says the last five nationwide take-back events have netted more than 2 million pounds of prescription medications.
In New Mexico, officials say keeping prescription drugs out of the wrong hands has become a matter of public safety and health. They say deaths due to prescription drugs now outnumber those caused by illicit drugs.
Copyright 2013 The Associated Press.