Letter: Out Of Reach
To the editor:
As a longtime Bloomington resident who suffers from allergy symptoms year round, I am concerned about efforts by some elected officials to place restrictions on the sale of basic allergy medicines.
I am strongly against a proposed prescription mandate for medicine like Sudafed and Allegra-D, both of which contain the decongestant pseudoephedrine.
I understand pseudoephedrine can be used to cook up meth. This is dangerous and often tragic, as we all know. Consumers who use pseudoephedrine properly, however, shouldn’t be subjected to the inconvenience, hassle and expense of an extra doctor’s visit.
Virtually all medicines, and for that matter household chemicals and other items, can be misused.
Making pseudoephedrine prescription only, however, will place one more safe and effective medicine out of the reach of regular people.
Identifying policy avenues such as the meth offender block list implemented in other states, that target criminals rather than the general populace, should be our goal.
It is my hope that lawmakers, while right in condemning meth production and abuse, will think about the rights and comfort of all before they take action on pseudoephedrine with unnecessarily punitive consequences.
Jonathan Yates
Bloomington