Table 1.

Comparison between the policies, collection and funding systems, regarding household medical waste in six selected countries

Country	National drug collection program	Legislation	Collection method	Funding	Medical collected (weight)/collection rates (annual)
USA	Some programs are run by the DEA [23], specific counties [25], and by local communities [42]	The law enables hospitals, clinics, pharmacies and drug producers to collect unused drugs [22]. In several counties and in one state (MA) there are legislations regarding forcing pharmaceutical companies to fund the collection and destruction of household medical waste [26–28]	Drug collection events, secured drop boxes, collection by law enforcement agencies and pharmacies [23–25, 43]	Usually DEA, law enforcement agencies and NGOs [20]. In specific counties, the Pharmaceutical companies [27]	0.01 kg/capita [44]
Canada	Most of the provinces and territories run such programs (See Table 3)	Household medical waste laws in several provinces [17, 18]	Drug collection events, secured drop boxes, and pharmacies [17, 18]	Government/pharmaceutical industry/pharmacies [17, 18]	Varies between provinces (on average 0.01-0.02 kg/capita) [18, 45, 46]
Hungary	Recyclomed [15, 47]	The law obliges the pharmaceutical industry to establish and operate a disposal system or give this duty to another organization [15]	Pharmacies and other selling points, containers in specific collection points [15]	Pharmaceutical Industry Groups [15]	0.02 kg/capita [15]
UK	No program	According to the UK environmental protection act and additional regulations, all Pharmacies are obliged to accept back unwanted medicines from patients [48].	All Pharmacies and hospitals [16, 48]. In addition, there are several local initiatives for collecting medical waste from homes [49]	Local governments [15].	Not available
Australia	RUM (Return Unwanted Medicines) [31]	Each state and territory have their own regulation regarding medicine disposal (embedded in the Drugs and Poisons Acts of each individual state)	Special containers mounted in all pharmacies [31]	Funded by the government until end of June 2018; then will be reconsidered. [31]	0.03 kg/capita [31]
Israel	No program	No legislation	HMO pharmacies are obliged to receive medicines from the public.	The Israeli Ministry of Health	13.9 % of the population [40]