In today’s newspaper you’ll find our Primary Election voter guide to local races, in addition to other stories in the paper outlining the May 24 vote.

Overall, it’s a significant look at our local candidates, and in their own words.

But among that volume of election information, one thing you’ll also find in this guide is an almost universal commitment by all law enforcement, judicial and district attorney candidates to tackle the national, state and local epidemic of illegal drug use.

Their concerns are valid. According to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, overdoses nationally claim 257 lives every day. Violence, often associated with drug-related activity, is dramatically on the increase: in 2020, homicides increased 30 percent, and 77 percent of the murders in the United States were committed with a firearm. In 2021, DEA and law enforcement partners seized more than 8,700 firearms connected to investigations of drug trafficking organizations.

To combat this unprecedented epidemic, the DEA launched, in conjunction with national, state and local law agencies, Operation Overdrive. Using national crime statistics and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data, authorities are able to identify “hot spots of drug-related violence and overdose deaths across the country,” down to the local level.

That agencies across the nation are coordinating in this effort is both encouraging and a positive action taken at a law enforcement level.

Still, there is more we can do, and on an individual level.

One steep problem of illegal drug use is due to the unneeded medications many of us have in our own homes. Too often, statistics show us — numbers that cross race, social and economic markers — overdoses are due to prescription medicines taken by those for who they were not prescribed.

Nationally, the DEA and others highlight a Prescription Drug Take Back Day, but we in Limestone County don’t need to wait for that invitation. Several pharmacies, including those at CVS, Walmart and Publix in Athens, are take-back sites where unneeded medications can be returned. Other pharmacies and institutions across North Alabama offer a similar service.

To find the take-back site nearest to you, visit the DEA’s locator at www.dea.gov/takebackday#collection-locator. Returning your unneeded medications to a take-back site today could easily save a life tomorrow.