How South Dakota Is Protecting Families On Prescription Take Back Day

Every spring and fall, people across South Dakota gather not for a festival or parade—but for something very important. On National Prescription Take Back Day, residents bring in their forgotten bottles and expired pills, doing their part to keep their homes and communities safe.

Twice a year, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration hosts National Prescription Take Back Day in the hope that it will keep families safe from the dangers of having unused and expired medications get into the wrong hands.

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This fall's take-back day is Saturday, October 25, 2025, and Dakota News Now is reporting that since joining the national effort in 2016, South Dakota has collected more than 113,000 pounds of unused medication. Each pill dropped off means one less chance of an accidental poisoning, overdose, or medicine ending up in the wrong hands.

At pharmacies, police stations, and community centers across the state, it’s a quiet kind of teamwork. Parents, grandparents, and teens show up with old prescriptions, and volunteers make sure they’re safely destroyed.

But the effort doesn’t stop there. The South Dakota Department of Social Services also offers free medication lock boxes, helping families store their prescriptions safely year-round.

If you can't make it to one of the drug take-back locations this Saturday, many pharmacies across Sioux Falls and the state have drop-off boxes that you can use year-round. Find a list of take-back locations here.

Take Back Day may only last a few hours, but its impact lingers far longer—protecting homes, preventing harm, and proving that sometimes, the smallest actions can make the biggest difference.

Source: Dakota News Now