{"id":172464,"date":"2025-09-21T19:53:13","date_gmt":"2025-09-21T19:53:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/172464\/"},"modified":"2025-09-21T19:53:13","modified_gmt":"2025-09-21T19:53:13","slug":"pharmacy-customer-shares-photo-of-frustrating-experience-while-picking-up-medication-thats-just-a-waste","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/172464\/","title":{"rendered":"Pharmacy customer shares photo of frustrating experience while picking up medication: ‘That’s just a waste’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Plastic packaging can be challenging to avoid<\/a>, and it’s especially frustrating when it comes with necessities such as prescription medications.<\/p>\n

While many pharmacies pack pills in paper bags, a Reddit user was stunned by one store’s excessive plastic packaging.<\/p>\n

What happened?<\/p>\n

On the subreddit r\/mildlyinfuriating, a customer shared an appropriately mildly frustrating encounter<\/a> with plastic waste after picking up a prescription at a chain pharmacy.<\/p>\n

A Walgreens receipt was visible.<\/p>\n

“The amount of packaging that comes with my pill bottle,” the original poster explained<\/a> alongside their photograph.<\/p>\n

\"It's<\/p>\n

Photo Credit: Reddit<\/p>\n

It depicted an almost comically small prescription bottle in a large plastic bag with printed instructions, which one commenter noted “is all required by federal and state laws and it sucks,” that could have easily fit in something smaller.<\/p>\n

“And each bottle gets its own packaging,” a commenter added<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“That’s just a waste,” another said<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Why is plastic waste such a big deal?<\/p>\n

Plastic became increasingly pervasive after World War II, but its negative environmental and health effects did not become apparent until later.<\/p>\n

At an individual level, plastic is not only everywhere, but it’s also harmful to human health<\/a>. The chemicals used to manufacture it have been linked to adverse outcomes including cancer, reproductive issues, and metabolic impacts.<\/p>\n

Discarding plastic is a separate problem altogether; it can take over 500 years for some types of plastic to break down. Landfilled plastic leaches toxins into soil while emitting potent heat-trapping gases, such as methane<\/a>, fragments into microplastics.<\/p>\n

Plastic also often ends up in the ocean or elsewhere in the environment, where it can injure or be ingested by animals that mistake it for food.<\/p>\n

According to Earth.org<\/a>, around 100,000 marine animals die each year because they ingest or become entangled in plastic. Moreover, plastic pollution claims the lives of roughly 1 million seabirds each year.<\/p>\n

What are companies such as Walgreens doing about plastic waste?<\/p>\n

According to Walgreens Boots Alliance<\/a>, the company has committed to four sustainability goals for its branded products.<\/p>\n

It says that by 2030 it will reduce plastic packaging by 30%, transition to 100% recyclable packaging, increase the recycled content in packaging, and eliminate all disposable packaging.<\/p>\n

It has already made progress by adopting white plastic caps instead of black ones for seven of its products, diverting an estimated 13 tons of plastic from landfills, and it’s worth noting that this plastic bag shown in the image is not seen across all prescription fills. Research indicated that the plastic bag is most often used with mail-order deliveries to further prevent tampering.<\/p>\n

While Walgreens does not offer a recycling program for empty bottles, organizations such as Matthew 25: Ministries accept clean bottles with caps.<\/p>\n

How are pharmacies and patients reducing plastic waste?<\/p>\n

CVS<\/a> partnered with Cabinet \u2014 a sustainable health care company that offers a national program to recycle plastic pill bottles \u2014 in over 700 stores.<\/p>\n

The Prescription Paper Pill Bottle, another eco-friendly packaging solution, could revolutionize the pharmaceutical industry with bottles that are fully compostable and biodegradable.<\/p>\n

Reusing plastic prescription bottles is another approach. A TikToker shared a creative way to give them a second life as hair product holders for traveling.<\/p>\n

Ditching single-use beauty products<\/a> for reusable alternatives, such as metal razors and bar shampoo, can save money in the long run and reduce plastic waste.<\/p>\n

Join our free newsletter<\/a> for good news and useful tips, and don’t miss this cool list<\/a> of easy ways to help yourself while helping the planet.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Plastic packaging can be challenging to avoid, and it’s especially frustrating when it comes with necessities such as…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":172465,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[58],"tags":[97,243,103080,103081,91475,21250,103079,250,35142],"class_list":{"0":"post-172464","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-medication","8":"tag-health","9":"tag-medication","10":"tag-pill-bottle","11":"tag-plastic-bag","12":"tag-plastic-packaging","13":"tag-plastic-waste","14":"tag-prescription-medications","15":"tag-reddit","16":"tag-walgreens"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/172464","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=172464"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/172464\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/172465"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=172464"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=172464"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=172464"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}