Drug Free USA

Why does the USA make "prescription" drugs so hard to get? You have to go to your doctor, pay a co-payment and possibly get a referral to a specialist, only to pay him and run a myriad of tests just to get a script that you have to take to a pharmacy, fill out more info, wait for an hour, then pay and finally have your meds. Yes, a lot of drugs are dangerous or controlled substances. Controlled substances should require ID and a log of why/how many times you are buying them. But as for the danger part, all drugs have warnings on them. Pick up any drug in your house, Tylenol, pepcid ac and they will all list overdose warnings, who should NOT take the medicine and possible side effects.

As a smart consumer, I always adhere to dosage recommendations. If I was really dumb, I could off myself by swallowing 200 Advil tablets, or drinking poison. Canada has a lot of online pharmacies, why don't we? I mean they make it so hard here to get birth control, and wonder why there are so many teenage pregnancies. If a teenager could readily buy birth control pills, I'm sure there would be a lot less.

I could buy drugs online, but it is a little scary with all the stories of people marketing fake pills, or lower dosages. Plus, the online companies won't take any form of insurance. Not a problem for about 1/2 of the medicine I have been prescribed, insurance only covers certain things. If all I want is a godamned skin cream, why can't I just buy it?

But the FDA warns against "sharing" prescription drugs. That is so absurd! I mean if I have acne, and I use a friends prescribed acne cream, the worst that would happen is that I could get a rash or other allergic reaction. But umm gee that could happen to my friend who it was prescribed for, too. The FDA puts ridiculous regulations on drugs, Tazorac is a popular acne medicine that has also been found to keep the skin youthful. Yet dermatologists are not allowed to prescribe this for anything but acne. WHY? You can get an Rx for trentoin, which if used daily can cause redness and peeling, so why not tazorac?

It is ridiculous that medications that are so commonly used are Rx only, like ones for allergies, acne and various other skin conditions. Zyrtec used to be Rx only, and it was such a bitch to keep getting refills, it was also very expensive. Then within a year, it was available at my local Walgreen's, in a HIGHER dosage that I had been getting thorough the doctors. The OTC version is cheaper, stronger and helps me much more than the Rx version did.

Once again, America is not the land of the free. If we were free to make our own decisions we could decide what medicines we should take/not take. Don't get me wrong, there are certain things that would absolutely require you to visit a doctor first. You would not take asthma medicine if you suspected you had asthma, you would first get it confirmed by a doctor.