BANNOCKBURN, Ill. – Feb. 12, 2020 – Stericycle, a leading provider of environmental and regulated waste management solutions, today announced it has been named a 2019 Sustainability, Environmental Achievement & Leadership (SEAL) Award winner for its impactful drug take back initiatives that have collected and destroyed more than 2.89 million pounds of pharmaceuticals. Earning recognition in the Environmental Initiative category, Stericycle’s program ensures unused or expired drugs are properly disposed to prevent them from making their way back into soil, waterways and other parts of our ecosystem.
"The SEAL Awards applaud Stericycle's drug take back program that has safely removed millions of pounds of pharmaceuticals that would otherwise pollute our waterways and our environment, causing danger to our communities,” said Matt Harney, Founder of the SEAL Awards. “Initiatives like this one are exactly what we need to celebrate: a corporate sustainability program that could be easily overlooked despite its innovation and tangible impact on our environment. We look forward to seeing how Stericycle will continue to positively benefit our environment and communities in the future.”
Stericycle’s program consists of two initiatives: Seal&Send medication mail back envelopes and medication collection kiosks. Together, these methods provide a safe, reliable and anonymous outlet for consumers and communities to properly dispose of unused medications. While many other programs require drug neutralizing pouches that add unnecessary and harmful materials into our environment, Stericycle’s Seal&Send envelopes are collected and incinerated. This sustainable process eliminates the possibility of filling up landfills, which can be detrimental to our environment and public health.
“Creating safer communities is at the heart of our mission at Stericycle, and this includes preventing harmful waste from entering the environment,” said Cindy Miller, Chief Executive Officer at Stericycle. “Since the inception of our drug take back initiatives in 2016, we’ve made major strides in improving the safety and sustainability of communities, and we’re honored that SEAL is recognizing our hard work in shifting the ways people think about managing environmental waste.”
Stericycle’s drug take back solutions prevent more than 100,000 pounds of unused or expired medication from ending up back in our ecosystem each month. Stericycle recently announced a definitive agreement to divest its Environmental Solutions business to Harsco, but Stericycle Inc. will maintain ownership of its consumer drug take back offerings. For more information on Stericycle’s drug take back services please visit: https://www.stericycle.com/services/waste-services/consumer-take-back-solutions
About Stericycle
Stericycle, Inc., (Nasdaq: SRCL) is a U.S. based business-to-business services company and leading provider of compliance-based solutions that protect people and brands, promote health and safeguard the environment. Stericycle serves more than one million customers in all 50 U.S. states and 20 countries worldwide with solutions for regulated waste management, secure information destruction, compliance and customer contact. For more information about Stericycle, please visit www.stericycle.com.
About the SEAL Awards
The SEAL (Sustainability, Environmental Achievement & Leadership) Awards is an awards-driven environmental advocacy organization. Our core beliefs maintain that our environmental progress requires true leadership and sustainability leaders deserve recognition. The SEAL Awards organizational pillars are:
- Sustainability Awards - honors the most sustainable companies in the world.
- Environmental Journalism Awards - representative past winners include journalists from Guardian, New York Times, and Vox
- Impact Projects - past work includes our campaign asking Yelp to better highlight sustainable restaurants
- Environmental Research Grants
For more information, please visit https://sealawards.com.