Studies are showing that the most widely sold oral decongestant in the US doesn’t do anything, but we already knew that. The name of the drug is phenylephrine, and its sold as a key ingredient in things like NyQuil and other cold medicines.

When the Feds decided to stop people from making Meth, they needed to pull pseudoephedrine from the market, so they were looking for a replacement and settled on phenylephrine.

In the hospital, the intravenous version of phenylephrine is called “neo” by nurses. It’s found in nasal sprays like neo-synephrine, where it works pretty well. It’s a vasoconstrictor, meaning that it causes blood vessels to constrict, and it can be useful for increasing a patient’s blood pressure without affecting heart rate when given in an IV, and it shrinks sinus tissue when sprayed in the nose. When given orally, not so much.

It also doesn’t work worth a darn as a cold medicine. Anyone who has tried taking it knows that it doesn’t really work. If you want a true decongestant, you have to go to the pharmacy counter and hand over ID so your cold medicine can be registered. I guess that way, the cops can more effectively catch those who make meth.

Except meth is still widely available, but now I can’t breathe whenever I have a cold.

Categories: Uncategorized

15 Comments

Bigus Macus · January 24, 2023 at 6:41 am

We know that Flu-Buddy didn’t work in “The Stand”

Bigus Macus · January 24, 2023 at 6:43 am

I’ll stick with old fashioned remedies like Bourbon and Honey.

Unobtainium · January 24, 2023 at 7:04 am

The Marxist EDU town 50 miles north is a capital of meth in Red State.
There is another one south about 60 miles.
The war on fried eggs from Nancy also killed Scotch-Gard and we knew a freak in HS who huffed it to get high.
A buddy who owned a dry cleaners treated my camo puffy coat with an original can!

George · January 24, 2023 at 7:27 am

Somewhere on one of my old computers, I had the recipe for getting pseudoephedrine out of meth.

Meth is easier to buy than cold medicine.

Don Curton · January 24, 2023 at 8:12 am

Amen! I can remember when we could get cold meds that would dry you up and allow you to go to work and actually do something. Nowadays it barely reduces the symptoms and provides no real relief.

nick flandrey · January 24, 2023 at 9:32 am

Except meth is still widely available, but now I can’t breathe whenever I have a cold.

— it’s more sinister than that. Anyone who is dependent on allergy drugs that contain decongestants to be comfortable and productive, as well as anyone searching for relief from the common cold has to go to the counter and ID themselves. That means that for me and a whole lotta people like me, .gov has a periodic and recurring record of where I am.

Every 3 weeks I have to present myself in person, ID myself, and beg for relief. It’s worse than the obligations of someone on parole.

How much of the population does something similar with dialysis? Other than the financial aspects, the .gov and industry partners have no incentive to manage or end diabetes when it makes such a good control mechanism and provides a tool for monitoring them. How else to monitor those no longer in the workforce, who are nominally footloose and fancy free?

How many other conditions provide something similar?
nick

TechieDude · January 24, 2023 at 9:36 am

When this happened I got to wondering just how much sudafed it would take to cook up a decent amount of meth. I’m guessing a crapload.

So wouldn’t it have been better to simply limit the sale to one per visit? Still keep it behind the counter, but they simply hand it to you to buy instead of signing for it like you would with fentanyl patches.

FFS, I wanted sudafed for me and mucinex dm for the wife. Could only buy one.

We’re ruled over by slack jawed retards.

    That guy · January 24, 2023 at 9:58 pm

    I think you meant Mucinex D.
    Mucinexe DM (dextromethorphan) is OTC and doesn’t require anything but the $$ to buy it. (In my state)
    Mucinex D has Sudafed in it so you have to do the dance.
    All this bullshit over the last what, 10+ years?, has only made meth more available, cheaper and easy to find.
    Good job feds!!👍🏻

SiG · January 24, 2023 at 12:22 pm

“In the hospital, the intravenous version is called “neo” by nurses.”

The IV version of which one: phenylephrine or pseudoephedrine?

I have bad inhalant allergies and have gone through five years of shots three times since the 1970s. I used to rely on Sudafed and then a few different prescription antihistamines. Phenylephrine never did a thing for me.

Nowadays, I can get by on all OTC meds because all of the old prescriptions went OTC, and the Zyrtec I used to take has given way to the old Actifed – tripolidine – taken as needed. Which hasn’t been in months. Only that seems to be going away, too.

    Divemedic · January 24, 2023 at 12:35 pm

    Phenylephrine is called neo, because the OTC version is neo-synephrine.

T Town · January 24, 2023 at 3:43 pm

I have given up on the oral meds for sinus congestion, and stick to Afrin, or its generic equivalent.

joe · January 24, 2023 at 6:05 pm

also restricted how many allergy tablets you can get…damn assholes

Joe Blow · January 25, 2023 at 6:36 am

Third post in a row (sorry, read from the top down)… your paradigm is out of kilter Brother. Thats why nothing makes sense.
From here it looks like you’re still clinging to the notion that people are altruistic and governments are benevolent. Thats why their actions make no sense.
Once you accept that the average man wouldn’t piss on your face if it was on fire, and that the government can’t decide if it wants you subjugated or dead, pieces start falling into place.
Its not you, its your paradigm.

    Divemedic · January 25, 2023 at 11:41 am

    People aren’t altruistic. They always make decisions based upon their own interests. That doesn’t mean that I can’t work with people who have similar or at least complimentary interests.

    Governments, being made of people, also always makes decisions based upon the interests of the people who have the levers of power.

    The problem, and it was one seen clearly by the founders IMO, is that people (including governments) can’t be trusted with power. So power must be diluted to the point where no one can use it to force his or her own interests on others.

Anonymous · January 25, 2023 at 1:49 pm

Glad you covered this topic, its annoying to hit flu season and have only enough to treat 10 days worth of flu for one person and then the rest of the month you are out of luck. It means that you have to go and stock up and buy a pack each month to have enough that when you do get sick or need a good decongestant you have enough to carry you through. Antibiotics is pretty much the same way. Thanks again and thanks for your blog, hows the boy doing?

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