Do You Favor......Putting Cold Medicines Behind The Counter

[tsquared]

or do you favor only the drug stores selling the cold medicine?
Here in Kansas they are debating stronly whether they should put it behind the counter or only let drugist sell it. I know the Kansas Food Dealers Association are strongly fighting putting it behind the counter so that grocery stores can still sell it too.
What do you think is the right way to go?

[Tasha405]

Are they doing this because people can make other drugs with these cold medicines?

If it would help keep them in the stores that sell them now and out of the wrong peoples hands, then I say put them behind the counter.

[sweetcandy]

My state is thinking of the same thing. Too many meth labs around here. I saw on the news last night one man was going to the drug stores and buying them out and he had a black duffel bag full of medicine and the police got him and he told them that he gets $100 or some meth for every 10 boxes of medicine. I don't think they should put them behind the counter though.

[buttrfli]

Oklahoma started doing that last year. They also passed a law that you can only buy 2 pkgs of (sudafed and the stuff like it) during a certain time period and have to show ID occasionally. My oldest DD works at walgreens and she said people would come in and completely lose it when they were not allowed to buy 10 boxes at a time anymore.

Our meth lab busts have gone down 70% since the implementation. I say if you aren't doing anything wrong, then you have nothing to worry about because you can still get the meds, you just have to ask for it.

*edited to add that I found what our law states*

Oklahoma State law allows only pharmacies to sell over-the-counter cold tablets that contain pseudoephedrine, and no more than nine grams of the ingredient are to be sold to one person during a 30-day period. Anyone buying more than nine grams is to be reported to police.

[buttrfli]

I don't think they should put them behind the counter though.

So where should they put them?

[tracyb]

I think if your are buying more than a few boxes of any medicine than it looks like you are up to no good...the problem with putting it behind something is that those of us that are honest and go by the law are being punished...9times out of 10 there is nobody there for you to get ot open up the storage and let you see the medicine and plus if you dont really know what you want they make you feel like your are making them sacrifice there time by standing there,just like it you go and buy a video game for your kid......the just stand there and fiddle and make noise witht her keys and you can here them sighing and that makes me make a fast decision to get away from the person who is irritating me........but I do thing that something should be done in places that are having trouble with this..

[BigLyd1]

Wow! :eek: That's interesting. I have yet to hear anything about this in my So Cal area. I'd be surprised though if they made such restrictions.

[Angelseyes28]

I know that it is being done for a good reason but honestly it's a pain in the butt for me. I needed to buy sudafed a few weeks ago while I was at walmart. Well the shelves were empty and there were signs taped where the sudafed should have been letting everyone know that it's now in the pharmacy. Ok great, I go to the pharmacy and guess what.....it wasn't open yet so I couldn't get the sudafed!!! GRRRRRRR

[buttrfli]

I know that it is being done for a good reason but honestly it's a pain in the butt for me. I needed to buy sudafed a few weeks ago while I was at walmart. Well the shelves were empty and there were signs taped where the sudafed should have been letting everyone know that it's now in the pharmacy. Ok great, I go to the pharmacy and guess what.....it wasn't open yet so I couldn't get the sudafed!!! GRRRRRRR

At Walgreens, they keep the sudafed behind a front counter. That way if the pharmacy is closed, any employee can unlock the cabinet and get it. I can understand the frusterations of them being locked in the pharmacy when they don't hold the same hours in the store.

Before they passed the "anti-meth" law here, my DD store was robbed several times a month. Since the laws inception, it has only been robbed once in over a year. I guess it might me more irritating to me if I used sudafed, but since I don't I think the benefits of the law outweigh the occasional upset customer. I will have to find the article where it showed how dramatically the meth lab busts have dropped off.

The sad part of it is that since its a statewide law, the residents of the smaller towns who don't have a meth problem, have to deal with it because of the "big city" problems.

[buglebe]

At Walgreens, they keep the sudafed behind a front counter. That way if the pharmacy is closed, any employee can unlock the cabinet and get it. I can understand the frusterations of them being locked in the pharmacy when they don't hold the same hours in the store.

Before they passed the "anti-meth" law here, my DD store was robbed several times a month. Since the laws inception, it has only been robbed once in over a year. I guess it might me more irritating to me if I used sudafed, but since I don't I think the benefits of the law outweigh the occasional upset customer. I will have to find the article where it showed how dramatically the meth lab busts have dropped off.

The sad part of it is that since its a statewide law, the residents of the smaller towns who don't have a meth problem, have to deal with it because of the "big city" problems.

I also think it is an inconvenience but yes I think it should go behind the counter. Remember paragoric? Didn't it go the same way? I don't know if you can even buy it anymore.

[Angelseyes28]

I also think it is an inconvenience but yes I think it should go behind the counter. Remember paragoric? Didn't it go the same way? I don't know if you can even buy it anymore.

I think you can get it as a prescription. That's what the pediatrician prescribed when my kids had colic.

[bribella]

Certain stores do that where I live either they are at the pharmacy or they have plastic cards with the name of medicine that you have to take up to the register with you and then the cashier will go get you the medicine. There is also a limit as to how many boxes you can buy and you have to be a certain age.

It doesn't bother me at all. It helps to prevent people from buying or stealing these medicines and turning around and making a dangerous drug with them.

Besides who really goes to the store and buys more than 1 or 2 boxes of sudafed at a time for legal use? Not me anyway....

[mistressB]

if it means that the meth cooker have a harder time getting the ingredients they need i'm all for it. it's not really that big of a deal if you ask me. my mother cooked drugs and would go store to store shoplifting these items. i was really glad when they put it behind the counter and limited how much you could buy at a time.

[jayhawkfan]

As a Kansas, I think its a great idea to put it behind the counter. I know at our grocery stores they keep them at the service desk, not in the pharmacy. From what I read its just the tablets they want controlled, the gel caps and the liquid are exempt because they cant make meth with those. If thats what it takes to help keep my family safe, I say go for it.

[annie169]

Wow! :eek: That's interesting. I have yet to hear anything about this in my So Cal area. I'd be surprised though if they made such restrictions.
Really?? They have put quantity limits here in the Palm Springs area. Even at Costco, you can only buy 2 boxes at a time. Must just be a regional thing?

BTW...I like the idea of meds being behind the counter

[BigLyd1]

Maybe I just don't shop for the OTC meds that often. When I do go to the drugstore, I usually go to Sav-On. I'll have to see if those meds are out. But I'm pretty sure that Ralphs and Stater Bros. keeps theirs out.

[catdance]

I am voting for putting it behind the counter, in Minnesota, just one county away is where my sister and her kiddies live, is METH capitol of Minnesota and this is NO JOKE, I want my niece and nephew to be very safe even at the risk, of the annoyance...and worse in really nice RURAL areas of Minnesota it is rampant, so if Sudafed needs, in my writing needs to be controlled so if for me to get it is a "hassle", I am ok with it, I can be patient and plan my needs, perhaps that saves a kid, from a horrifying drug..(meaning the making of METH)...and what is even worse, I see people I swear, drinking Lysol, Pine-Sol and also Brut, that is scarey too, in some places you can't buy Listerine and the likes after 10:00 PM beleive that? And in pharmacies and local gas stations that stuff is behind the counter too, mostly for theft reasons,people drink it to get HIGH... I asked the Walgreens guy the other day..terrible!!

[laughsalot]

I read an article in the newspaper a couple of weeks ago about this. In my opinion they should put it behind the counter. Who cares if I have to wait a few extra minutes for someone to get it for me. If it in anyway knocks a dent in people trying to make Meth then so be it. Sure they will find ways around it but at least it will make it harder for them to obtain.

Dang~I cant believe that people will drink Brut or Lysol. lord have mercy I wonder does it give them heartburn?! I must live a sheltered life.

[jonette5]

I am all for putting it behind the counter. I live in Franklin County Missouri and we are known as the "Meth Capitol of the USA" NO KIDDING! The meth problem around here is awful and if putting those drugs behind a counter will help with the problems I say go for it! I honestly don't think it will help though, cuz if the "meth heads" want something bad enough, they will find a way to get it.

[schsa]

Put it behind the counter and make it harder for people to break the law. I am willing to take a few extra seconds to get whatever cold medicine I need if it stops some kid from taking meth.

[schsa]

Some 65 officials from 14 states gathered in St. Louis, Mo., in December to push for stricter laws, despite opposition from retailers and drug companies defending the $1.8 billion cold-remedy market. According to Lonnie Wright, director of the Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics, Schedule V reclassification has "revolutionized" meth enforcement in the state, with busts dropping from more than 100 a month in 2003 to about 20. The rate could fall further in the next few months as every Oklahoma pharmacy gets a new computer program showing whether a customer has recently bought pseudoephedrine products elsewhere. "Simply by putting this stuff behind the counter, we have made this a manageable problem," Wright says.

If other states balk at the Oklahoma model, they may find themselves in the position of next-door Kansas, which saw a rash of meth cooks cross the state line after Oklahoma passed its law. "Any state in the Midwest that doesn't pass the bill this year has the opportunity to become the meth capital of the region," says Corporal Jason Grellner, the Franklin County, Mo., deputy who organized the St. Louis meeting. "And believe me, nobody wants that." Texas is considering going even further, requiring a prescription for any drug--such as some Sudafed products--whose sole active ingredient is pseudoephedrine.

Pfizer, the company that makes Sudafed, is moving to respond. In February it begins shipping Sudafed PE, a second line of its cold drug, which replaces pseudoephedrine with phenylephrine, a decongestant that cannot be used in the production of meth and has been available for years in Europe. But the company is also eager to point out ways in which the legislative backlash may be misguided: Pfizer spokesman Jay Kosminsky says that a problem with some current state laws, including Oklahoma's, is that they exempt liquid or gel-cap medications and multi-ingredient medications that contain pseudoephedrine, in the mistaken belief that those items cannot be cooked into meth.

This came from this weeks' Time Magazine On line