I haven't purchased pseudeophedrine, but my understanding was that you just walked up to the counter and had to sign your name at the pharmacy. Is that not the case? Doesn't seem like a big pain if that's the case.
The prescription line is always fun. I remember some dude coughing on everyone, picking up his cell phone, "oh it was positive? great, I'm in line to get the medication" referring to COVID. In my opinion, the easiest place to get sick is waiting in the prescription line. Yet another tax on congestion sufferers.
Having said all that, your doctor can write you a prescription and all the restrictions go away, including the ID check. It has always delayed my fills even further so we don't bother anymore.
The most positive outcome from buying pseudoephedrine in line was being told "hey, your ID expires tomorrow" which was a good catch. I wasn't paying any attention to that. (I don't drive, so it's just a piece of plastic with my name. But necessary for paying taxes online in NYS.)
Source: I've been paying taxes in NY with a learner's permit that's been expired for well over a decade.
Edit: I've also used said expired permit to buy pseudoephedrine. In my experience, they get frustrated and put random garbage into the tracking system when the card doesn't verify, demonstrating that it's all theater. It did take a while, though, so your point about this being a waste of time holds.
In what reality? You were not being paid $60 to grocery shop or whatever else you might have done with that 15 minutes. Nor did it actually reduce your bank account by $60 to wait 15 minutes. If you applied this logic to everything in life, reading this very comment probably "cost" you a dozen bucks too. What a fun way to live?
> Meanwhile, other drugs are just mailed to me, including my prescriptions.
How often are your anticipating needing pseudoephedrine? For most people it's a once a year, at most, thing.
That phenylephrine (which everyone with sinuses knows doesn't do a damn thing) was perpetually being touted as a substitute was just adding insult to injury.
No, that's the inflated list price that's only paid by people with an emergency while out of network or similar unfortunates -- not insurance companies.
A simple google search before posting would have made your fictitious scenario a little bit more believable.
Technically true but it is often paired with loratadine in, e.g., Claritin-D. Many allergy sufferers also get congested sinuses.
The side affects of prolonged pseudoephedrine use (usually defined as more than 7 days, btw) are far more serious than a stuffy nose.
You cannot even purchase enough pseudoephedrine to use every day over a full month. The government restricts maximum grammage per month - and no doctor is going to prescribe long-term use of pseudoephedrine to "help with allergies".
That is to say I don't believe your story at all. But I get it - googling these things before you posted would have "cost" you approximately $24 or something something something...
If one can treat the symptoms just as easily as the cause and pseudoephedrine doesn't make them feel like a drugged-out zombie, just guess which drug people are going to take...
...and yes, doctors actually will write prescriptions for pseudoephidrine because they're generally pretty sure their patients aren't using it to make meth. I know three people who've gotten such prescriptions, and I've been tempted to do the same thing myself.
It also means you can't get it delivered, can't stock up, might have trouble sending someone else to get it, etc.... It's a big pain for some people, and particularly for people who already have a harder life than average.
Claritin-D 24-hour caplets come in boxes of 10. You need 3 boxes to get a full month's supply. Each caplet has 240mg of pseudoephedrine – 2.4g per box.
In my state, individuals can purchase up to 9g of pseduoephedrine per month, but only up to 3.6g per day.
So, while I can technically purchase a full month's supply of Claritin-D, I can't buy more than one box at a time.
These sorts of rules are minor inconveniences for an individual compared to the rest of life's challenges, but they exist in a special category of stupid that make them all the more frustrating.
But, here's a thought: what if I had children who needed the same medication? Who's going without?
> Some people stopped buying pseudoephedrine entirely, either because they were offended by these rules or because they were afraid that they could wrongly be implicated in meth investigations if they appeared to buy it too often.
This has actually happened [0], and I seem to remember more instances (at least when the law was first passed). I know I have also gone to buy it in a headache-induced fog and found that I've forgotten my ID, and on at least one occasion the national drug whatever system was down and they refused to sell it. Because it has to be run through the specific national database, it has to be run through one department and I have been unable to purchase because that department has closed for the day.
These are just what comes to mind when I think about purchasing pseudoephedrine over the years; it's just generally become a pain to get. It makes me wonder if it'd be quicker and easier to just buy meth and reintroduce the hydroxyl group to get my cold medicine.
[0] https://reason.com/2009/09/28/hoosier-grandmother-arrested-f...
Relevant: “A Simple and Convenient Synthesis of Pseudoephedrine from Meth” https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33444852 https://maggiemcneill.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/synthes...
If aliens were to visit they'd likely bypass contact on grounds that the planet's inhabitants are low-IQ nut cases.
Damn stupid isn't it? I'd be funny if it weren't serious.
What's more most of these sympathomimetic amines are both simple organic molecules, and in numbers/types they're a dime-a-dozen so to speak—there are hundreds of them. Any number of which can be altered or 'metamorphosed' into others that have different physiological and psychological effects by almost any competent chemist.
I'm certainly not advocating the use of meth but it's clear to me that the regulations that control the distribution and use of these amines are not working. Essentially, all these brute-force/unsophisticated laws have done is to inconvenience legitimate users and have drug barons streamline the production of more efficient precursors such as phenylacetone (P2P).
We really do need a better way of approaching the problem. For instance, many drug users turn to illicit amines and other street drugs to overcome medical and psychological problems. It would make sense to have these people identified and then be treated by the health system before they turn to the street to 'help' them. Moreover, I'd reckon it'd be much cheaper than the millions now spent on enforcement.
Trouble is moral panic and an almost complete lack of understanding by both lawmakers and law enforcement of the problem and its underlying causes is significantly impeding progress.
There aren't exactly signs that say "Hey, the good stuff is behind the counter and you don't need a prescription to get it".
It's much less convenient than going to the nearest 24-hour store and grabbing it off the shelf. And I'm a doctor married to a doctor; I don't have to get an appointment to get a prescription for a non-scheduled drug, but I do have to go during pharmacy hours and wait to pick it up.
Because of US restrictions on pseudo, bizarrely other countries have followed suit - it’s next to impossible to find a decongestant with pseudo here in Ireland, they will sell you the useless phenylephrine shit instead, and the packaging is almost indistinguishable unless you spend a while looking and arguing with a pharmacist who is convinced phenylephrine works just as good.
Replace pseudo with cannabis and the statement remains true.
So he has to drive around to ~5 pharmacies to occasionally score a a box.
He does try to stock up during low season, but it's hard to do.