Prohibition 2.0

[jminnis]

The war on drugs continues unabated. Pseudoephedrine must be purchased from behind the prescription counter, even though it is not a prescription drug.

The result of this increase in labor requirements for pharmacies and hassle for cold, flu, and allergy sufferers?

Outsourcing of production to Mexico.

From the National Drug Threat Assessment

Comments

[percussivebunny]

meth has been coming from mexico for a while. this behind the counter bull-shit is really quite stupid.

[jminnis]

Aye. I'm glad I don't take Claritin-D anymore.

[olstad]

I know that at least in Oregon, this is explicitly the goal. Make meth obnoixously hard to create, giving a competitive advantage to distant, large producers. The goal is that this will shut down the local guys with their highly toxic/explosive, poorly run lab in the apartment next to yours.

[jminnis]

I wasn't thinking about the hazards of the local producers.

According to Wikipedia:

"One of the more obvious signs of a production lab of methamphetamine in operation is an odor similar to that of cat urine. Meth labs can also give off noxious fumes, such as phosphine gas, mercury vapors, lead, methylamine gas, solvent fumes; such as acetone or chloroform, iodine vapors, white phosphorus, anhydrous ammonia, hydrogen chloride/muriatic acid, hydrogen iodide, lithium/sodium metal, ether, or methamphetamine vapors.

"When performed by individuals who are not trained chemists, methamphetamine manufacture can lead to extremely dangerous situations. For example, if an amateur chemist allows the red phosphorus to overheat, due to lack of proper ventilation, phosphine gas can be produced. When produced in large quantities, the gas usually explodes, due to autoignition from diphosphine formation caused by overheating phosphorus."I can see why stopping this in your neighborhood would be a good thing. I'm just not convinced that making