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The figure is staggering - 9.9 million.

That's how many Americans misuse prescription drugs, according to the 2018 National Survey on Drug Use and Health.

But it's not just about the number. It's about how these potentially dangerous drugs are accessed. That same Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) study showed that most of these prescriptions were snagged from family and friends - whether the patient willingly handed them over or the person simply helped themselves to someone's medicine cabinet.

It's a problem - one that Health First is helping the community tackle.

On Saturday, October 24, volunteers at Health First's Cape Canaveral Hospital teamed up with Cocoa Beach Police and the Cocoa Beach Fire Department during the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration's (DEA) semiannual National Prescription Drug Take Back Day. The idea? To provide people a safe place to drop off unwanted prescriptions, with no questions asked (as in no IDs or signatures required). Almost 150 pounds of old or unused controlled prescription drugs were collected during the event and were safely disposed of.

"For the safety of our community, and the safety of our children, we ask that unused, unwanted, and/or expired medications be made both 'unusable' and 'unretrievable' when disposing of these drugs," said Ron McGrier, Director of Pharmaceutical Services at Health First Health Plans. "If you want to turn in your medications in prescription bottles, or their original drug packaging, community drug take back programs help to secure this drug waste, so that these drugs can be properly handled, transported and disposed of."

But this isn't an effort that Health First participates in just one day a year. Health First Family Pharmacy - which has locations at Health First's Holmes Regional Medical Center, Health First's Viera Hospital Medical Plaza and Health First Medical Group-Gateway - always has a standing drop-off bin for people to pitch unneeded prescriptions. In the past year alone, the three sites have collected 2,179 pounds of unwanted medications.

Semiannual drug take back days are a national effort to eliminate easy access to controlled drugs, which, in turn, lowers the number of drug addictions and overdose deaths.

Prescription drug misuse is nothing to scoff at, and research by the National Institute on Drug Abuse shows that it's the highest among Americans 18 to 25 years old. Among this age range, as many as 1 in 20 revealed they'd taken part in recreational use of prescription drugs in the past year. The reason why? The Institute points to the dramatic rise in prescriptions (especially for narcotics) over the past 25 years, as well as how they can be relatively easy to access.

If you missed the event but have prescriptions in your home you'd like to properly dispose of, feel free to stop by a Health First Family Pharmacy near you. Visit hf.org/familypharmacy or call 321.434.7355 for more information and hours.