Stupid nanny state

I am filled with a beautiful, white hot flame of unspeakable rage right now at the nanny state.  As my friends on Facebook know, I currently have a headcold.  It’s rather annoying, because normally I just pop down a few Advil Cold and Sinus and I’m good to go.  This bad boy required abnormal amounts of pseudophedrine to provide relief, so I burned through my supply a little faster than usual.

Today, I went to a local pharma to get more.  My purchase was declined, because apparently when they ran my license they saw I just bought some cold pills on Tuesday…because that’s when I got sick.  The girl behind the counter said, “You can’t buy this, you just bought some on Tuesday and you’re over your limit for the week.”

I kid you not, for like 30 seconds I couldn’t even see I was so angry.  I was opposed to the stupid “anti-methlab law” to begin with back when they first passed it, and I had no idea that they now tracked your purchases with your driver’s license.  I seriously almost lost my mind.  However, here’s the best part – the actual conversation with the counter girl:

Counter Girl: “I’m sorry sir, you can’t buy this.  You just bought some this week and you’re over your limit.”
Me: “Yes, well I’m still sick.”
CG: “Well, we can’t sell it to you in case you’re cooking meth.”
Me: “…”
CG: “If you have someone else in your house, they can buy it for you!”
Me: “So I can have someone buy me something that you won’t sell me, effectively skirting the law?”
CG: “Uh…well…that’s not what I meant…”
Me: shakes head

So now I have to ask my wife to do what amounts to a straw purchase of Sudafed 12 hour for me.

And yet despite all these laws, people are still cooking meth! So clearly, making me suffer with congestion is OBVIOUSLY worth it, right? Stupid nanny state.

25 Comments

  1. Is this actually the law? I mean, I can believe it is because it sounds like the kind of useless law politicians would pass to show the masses they care so they can get reelected. But this shit always struck me as coming from the stores as it seems the rules are different from store to store.

  2. Look at the positive side: you were prevented from buying too much. Do a search for “Radley Balko Sudafed,” some grandma in Indiana bought too much, and then was arrested for it.

  3. Jose – as far as I can tell, it’s the law. I bought the stuff on Tuesday from a CVS, and today I tried to buy it at Walgreens. The state law forbids the purhcase of more than 3 grams of psuedophedrine in a week.

  4. “The state law forbids the purhcase of more than 3 grams of psuedophedrine in a week.”

    Well once your current cold is over, it is time to stockpile a couple of weeks worth of Sudafed. As long as you smurf it under the limit, then you’ll be fine.

  5. I especially like that I now have to buy my Sudafed from a person behind a counter that’s only open part of the day. Because I only have sinus problems during daylight hours and never on holidays.

    Especially annoying as I was once able to buy 100+ of the damned things at a shot right off the shelf.

  6. We have q similar and equally moronic law in AL. I can remember when I worked at Walmart the people cooking meth would come in as a group, each person would buy the maximum allowed amount, and then they’d all pile into the same minivan with plastic and duct tape windows and go about their merry way.

    The smell of them was the worst part. It lingered for hours.

  7. You must have a good wife. She’s willing to purchase drugs for your use with the risk that if she gets sick you could both be over your limit and she would have to suffer.

  8. I can’t take pseudoephidrine anymore because of my blood pressure. Try the saline irrigation/neti pot thing, worked for me last spring during allergy season.

  9. I remember there used to be an over the counter product called “Efidac” with 240mg of pseudoephedrine. Those were the days.

  10. Remember this experience when you read about anyone anywhere asking for more money to keep certain drugs illegal. Laws like these are the natural consequence of the war on drugs. If you support any aspect of the war on drugs, you supported this law.

    I don’t have to show ID to buy grain, yeast and copper line, but I could use those things to make a legal drug that has destroyed many more lives than meth has.

  11. I believe it is a Federal law. It is such a hassle for the stores, that some no longer sell the good stuff. What is really stupid is that you can’t even buy enough to cover you for the legal time frame. The recommended dosage will only last for 50% of the time between purchases, IF you are lucky. The whole thing is a joke. If they really wanted to put a crimp in purchases by meth heads, it could be done without all this bull.

  12. How truly insane. Are other states also doing this now? I am very surprised this hasn’t yet been implemented here in CA.

  13. I know this won’t work now for you with this being the weekend and all, but get a doctor’s prescription for the O.C. meds you want and the law goes away. I know because during different periods of the year I’m on a daily dose of Claritin-D and my needs exceed this silly law.

    A script over-rules the law.

    All The Best,
    Frank W. James

  14. The Law here in NE requires youto sign a logbook when you buy the stuff. LE suspects you are cooking, they look at log books……. and pay you a visit if it looks like you are. Seems like a lot of tomfoolery to avoid just asking the neighbors if the denizens of that trailer are/ appear to be engaged in …….. shall we say …….. independent pharmacuetical endeavors?

    It may have helped: all the local cooks are either dead or in jail. Now the Stuff comes from Cali and Mexico via gangs.

  15. Yeah. Try that as a mom with a houseful of kids, who lives 30 minutes from town.

    It is literally illegal for us to own enough cold medicine to see the family through one, single, three-day bout with a cold.

  16. Lindsey brought that up when we were talking about this today. What exactly are parents supposed to do? How do you buy enough cold medicine for an entire family when you’re limited to 3 grams a week or whatever?

  17. PAX, How many kids do you have, how much pseudophedrine can one legally “stockpile”, and how much pseudophedrine is in one pill?

    I usually have a bottle and a box of meds in my frig because when a cold hits me, I don’t realize it until it keeps me from sleeping. Being that 1 am in a snowstorm when I’m too tried to drive is never a good time to go to the store, I keep some on hand. First cough that keeps me up and it is off to the frig.

    Of course, none of my stuff has pseudophedrine or else it would defeat the point of trying to sleep.

  18. FYI, you can get a doctor to write you a prescription and that’ll bless going over the limit.

    Can’t wait until health care is ‘free’. You’ll pine for the days when you only had to wait a week to get permitted to buy more of the medicine you need.

  19. It is federal law. There is a daily limit of 3.6 grams, a monthly limit of 9 grams. Of course, many states have their own laws as well. What I do is have my doctor write a scrip for a pack of 96 renewable every month.

  20. Sudafed 12 hour has 24 pills at 120mg each. Recommended use is two pills per day thus 12 “person-days.” So two people should be 6 days. (Caleb, be careful, you blew thru a box in 4 days, we don’t need you in the hospital.)

    Claritin-D at 240 mg/pill, 15 pills/box thus one box = 3.6g of pseudoephedrine.

    If I buy one box per month I am well under the 9 g limit. But if I never use the pills, after three months I’ll have over 10 grams. It seems this is perfectly legal. So I am missing something?

    It is still a stupid law. Just because there is an easy “work-around” does not mean I should have to stockpile cold medication

    Here is an “easy” fix to many of today’s problems:
    Proposed Amendment 28: Must raise kids to be in Congress.

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