4 ms·
This is what Mexico does, and it works fine. There are no prescriptions in Mexico. Medications which are scheduled controlled substances (amphetamines, codien
by crotchfire 3y ago
This is what Mexico does, and it works fine.
There are no prescriptions in Mexico.
Medications which are scheduled controlled substances (amphetamines, codiene, morphine, etc) are sold directly by hospitals. There really aren't many of these, and hospitals already have to stock most of them for surgical use.
Everything else is cash over the counter.
And pseudoephedrine is illegal because of pressure from the US.
- raffraffraff 3y agoI'm glad pseudoephedrine is legal where I live. Once in a blue moon, if I need it, I can get it. Is it illegal in Mexico because meth comes from there in significant quantities?
- crotchfire 3y agoIt's illegal in Mexico because the US put pressure on them. The US said "you need to stop selling this without a prescription system". So Mexico stopped selling it entirely.
- raffraffraff 3y agoThat's crazy. I can but it over the counter without a prescription.
- crotchfire 3y agoNot without showing ID, you can't. And the ID tracking system is part of the prescription system, even though there's no doctor involved. It's why you can only buy pseudoephedrine from pharmacists.
- andyjohnson0 3y agoWhat about drugs that can have harmful interactions with a person's other health conditions or other drugs that they are taking? A big part of the role doctors and pharmacists in the prescribing process is to guard against this. Are ordinary, non-medically qualified people really supposed to navigate this on their own?
- zaptheimpaler 3y agoOrdinary people can and do in many places. Pharmacies can still employ pharmacists who will advise you or ask questions if you’re something risky that may interact with others. You can always check with a doctor before hand. Most medicines don’t have significant interactions and those that do you will usually be warned to check about by both doctors and pharmacists. A lot of “safety” concerns is just FUD spread by a system that wants to preserve itself.
- solatic 3y agoIf you have humans in the loop, they're going to make mistakes. Pharmacists and doctors also have bad days and forget things. People are their own best advocates and caretakers. If there's a database with contraindicators, make it public, let people search it, require packaging to inform the public to search the database for contraindicators for their own safety before taking the drug. If people are really unsure, they can decide to engage a doctor or pharmacist instead of being forced to engage a doctor or pharmacist.
- TeMPOraL 3y agoDoctors are navigating interactions in large parts by database lookups anyway - there are websites where you enter drugs and get a list of possible interactions. Those could be made available to patients too (the one I saw a doctor in my family using is provided by some medical website and softly gated "for doctors use only").
- willcipriano 3y agoNatural selection will eventually handle the crowd of people who take random drugs without considering possible interactions. Hardware stores also sell many things that will kill you if used incorrectly. We can't have the world revolve around the least capable of us, it's holding everyone back.
- nonfamous 3y agoIf doctors and pharmacists were effective in preventing all adverse interactions, we wouldn’t have those “don’t take ADVERTIX if…” disclaimers in US drug ads.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- EE84M3i 3y agoAre prescriptions required for antibiotics?
- crotchfire 3y agoNope. And the world has not imploded. There's a lot of chicken-little-ism around the prescription system