I've been thinking that it might be a good idea to make hydrocodone available over the counter. Right now enormous amounts of health care dollars are going to pay for patients using ERs to obtain Lorcet. If we could make it available kinda like alcohol (you must be 18, illegal to drive while on the stuff, tax the heck out of it...) think of the money we could save, in addition to using the tax money to fund rehab.
Since I've been a nurse, many drugs that were previously availabe only by prescription have gone over the counter: sudafed, benadryl, actifed, claritin, tavist-d, rogaine, ibuprofen, naprosyn, tagamet, pepcid, prevacid, cortisone cream, monostat, pyridium, nicotine patches and gum... I'm sure there's more that can't think of right now. Plus in many places cough medication with codeine is available otc (although you must sign it out with the pharmacist). You don't need a prescription for insulin either (at least in my state). Several states are making the morning after pill available otc and the fda is thinking of adding cholesterol lowing drugs to the current otc list.
The potential for abuse is way too dangerous to make it OTC not to mention that most health insurance plans would not pay for it anymore and it would probably be way too expensive for the average person. Look what happened to claratin, I paid $8.00 for the prescription but since it went OTC I can't afford it anymore.
Actually if you do a search there is a thread on here about the FDA doing the oposite and taking it (hydrocodone) from a Class 3 narcotic and making it a Class 2, ie you would have to see the doctor for every refill, the estimated cost in health care dollars is in the billions.
cnyrn
56 Posts
Plus they got great beer, Collective Soul and their money is worthtless!