So this is why you can't find name brand over the counter allergy medications anymore. Gee, now I will have to make an appointment with my doctor - -pay him money to get a prescription. Hard working and honest people just can't seem to get any relief.
Your next purchase of a popular allergy or cold medicine may be recorded and tracked by computer in an effort to curb illegal methamphetamine production.Pseudoephedrine, or PSE, found in nonprescription medications such as Sudafed, can be used to make the highly addictive drug methamphetamine, considered a significant problem in the southwestern part of the state.
Medicines with PSE can be sold in Virginia only in limited amounts by purchasers showing identification and who sign for it. But the restrictions can be avoided with fake IDs or by "smurfing" — going from store to store buying legal amounts.
The problem is growing and now the General Assembly's Joint Commission on Health Care and the Virginia State Crime Commission are considering some new steps that include computer-tracking purchases and/or changing state laws.
The reviews were prompted by a bill proposed in 2010 by state Sen. W. Roscoe Reynolds, D-Henry, that would have made PSE available by prescription only. The bill was passed by so the issue could be studied.
Police say methamphetamine can be made by mixing decongestants containing PSE with flammable and toxic chemicals in small laboratories — and even in large plastic drink bottles in a dangerous process dubbed "shake and bake."
According to the Consumer Healthcare Products Association, two states — Oregon and Mississippi — now require a prescription for PSE medications while 17 others have adopted a real-time, statewide electronic system to track non-prescription PSE purchases and block purchases that exceed legal limits.
The system, called the National Precursor Log Exchange, or NPLEx, is paid for by the pharmaceutical industry, which sees it as a better alternative than making the medications available to consumers by prescription only.
Each purchase is recorded, and the NPLEx data is said to be confidential and accessible only to law enforcement.
After listening to a presentation on the PSE issue last week, Crime Commission members did not express an interest in making medicines with PSE prescription drugs.
However, the commission staff was told to study NPLEx and to find out how popular PSE drugs are in the state. The joint commission on health care may back a particular approach to the problem at its November meeting.
Del. Terry G. Kilgore, R-Wise, and a member of the crime commission, said Wednesday, "There's a lot of things we need to look at."
"A bunch of us legislators from the Southwest met with the state police and it's really picking up and it's really become a problem — especially this shake and bake," he said.
According to Virginia State Police figures, of the 34,168 drug arrests across the state in 2010, just 487 were for meth or amphetamines.
But the state police say the number of meth lab incidents (lab seizures or the finding of dump sites, chemicals and equipment) rose statewide from 53 in 2005 to 158 so far this year — with 152 of them in Southwest Virginia.
"Meth is a significant problem, especially in the far Southwest," said James R. Gregorius, special agent in charge of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration's Richmond office.
And it's also a growing problem, he said, "because of the advent of these small, clandestine labs. The number of (lab) seizures have tripled in the last two years. They call them a lab, and they are, but some of them are literally in a two-liter Coke bottle."
Michele Chesser, a health policy analyst with the joint commission on health care, told the Crime Commission last week that most meth is manufactured in Mexico. But, she said, small-scale production is increasing in Virginia.
Chesser said a box of 24-hour allergy medicine can yield 3.6 grams of PSE and that 10 grams of PSE can yield 6 to 8 grams of meth.
Federal law bars selling or buying more than 3.6 grams of PSE per day or 9 grams a month to the same person. State law bars buying more than 3.6 grams per day, but not more than 9 grams per month.
Most of the PSE used in small meth labs is obtained by people using fake IDs or by "smurfing," Chesser said. She said it is difficult to prosecute purchasers using fake IDs or "smurfers" for the possession of PSE with the intent to manufacture meth.
Changes under consideration by the joint commission on health care include making it illegal to: purchase PSE beyond certain amounts; to possess or acquire more than 9 grams of PSE in a 30-day period; or to acquire PSE by fraud, deceit or forgery.
The propriety of making it a prescription drug in Virginia has been called into question by the attorney general's office.
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