New script for Sudafed?
By John Gramlich
Stateline.org Staff Writer
Oregon raised eyebrows in 2005 when it became the first state to require a doctor's prescription for tablets of Sudafed, Claritin D and several other common cold and allergy medicines. Intended to stop production of crystal meth - which is made with a decongestant found in those medicines - the law was panned by some as a huge hassle.
Oregonians, one blogger wrote on the liberal Daily Kos Web site, would be forced to take time off work, drive to the doctor, sit in a waiting room, open their wallets for a $15 or $20 co-pay and drive to the pharmacy - all for a $6 box of Sudafed "for your case of the sniffles."
Five years later, Oregon's law is raising eyebrows again. This time, it's because the number of meth labs found in the state has plummeted from 192 in 2005, the year before the prescription law went into effect, to just 10 last year - even as they've surged in other states. Combined with other anti-meth measures that all states have adopted, such as putting targeted cold medicines behind the counter instead of selling them off the shelf, monthly meth lab seizures have declined 96 percent in Oregon.
