Drugs of Choice

Do you also have this discussion in your home: A medication will expire and one of you will want to get rid of it while the other thinks it’s a waste. 

I can understand if, say, it’s Aspirin and it’s only a few weeks past due. But what if it’s an antibiotic and it’s a year out of date? For example, I have to take antibiotics before I go to the dentist so I have a bottle of them to take when needed. They could expire before I use them all.

The country’s leading pharmacist’s association was asked about this very issue late last week. So is it just a make-work project for the medication manufacturers or should we heed those dates like we do the ones for expired milk? The answer: it varies!

Best-before or use-by dates are set by the manufacturer and they apparently use their best guesses. It’s also in their best interest to keep it conservative because they can open themselves up to liability claims if their drugs expire earlier than they claim. Imagine if a birth control pill morphs into a placebo and nine months later, well, you know. In fact, that’s what started reporters finally asking about dates on drugs. A pharmacy out west mistakenly sold some expired packets of The Pill and moved quickly to let the purchasers know. Sadly, after all of the discussion and questions and answers we’re still left to make our own decisions. As of the expiry date, the product is believed to not be 100% effective anymore. So is 95% effective enough? How about 45%? Before I stopped him, hubby had five year old muscle relaxants in his medicine cabinet that he claimed worked just fine. The debate continues.

9 thoughts on “Drugs of Choice”

  1. No debate, they’re expired they’re gone! Then the debate begins on how best to dispose of the item safely.

  2. It’s pretty simple really. If five year old muscle relaxants relax your muscles when you take them, what logical reason is there for throwing them out? If there are more serious consequences to taking a medication that might be less effective due to age or improper storage like the example you give of birth control pills, you would be wise to use fresh ones lest you be burdened with a screaming little shit machine. It amuses me no end when people throw out perfectly good food because it reaches a possible expiry date. If milk smells good it’s still good. If frozen foods aren’t showing signs of freezer burn they’re fine.
    Like most things in life, when dealing with expiry dates we need to use common (not sure why it’s called that) sense and we need to read between the lines. If we buy 30/40/50% more food/drugs in a year because we are throwing out perfectly good stuff due to a somewhat arbitrary date set by the company who will benefit financially by selling more, we should really think about whether we are being manipulated by fear and misinformation for profit or by purely benevolent aspirations. Which is more likely?

    1. I’m sure there are times when the date is accurate and the product is no longer useful. Remember our grandparents’ freezer full of pies? They had no freezer burn but they tasted like glue. I agree that it’s a financial benefit for the company but I also can’t say for certain what happens to every product if it starts to break down. You present good logic but I don’t think it’s always just black and white.

  3. A widely cited FDA study tested more than 100 medications that had been stockpiled by the military, and found that 90 percent of them were safe and effective for years after the expiration date. Years, not weeks, not months.

  4. Of course it is. Since big pharma started funding the FDA with so called ‘user fees’, the FDA will do anything in it’s power to keep that industry happy. It’s not likely they’re going to announce information that will cause the industry that feeds them to make less money.

  5. Well you can’t really cite them as an example in one instance and discredit them in another. They’re either credible or they’re not.

  6. Doh! Talk about destroying your own credibility. I guess from now on I’ll reread previous comments before adding a new one. Lol!

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