Police and teachers polled do not believe it is a good idea to force Americans to visit a doctor to get a prescription to purchase commonly sold cough and cold medicines. However, an FDA Advisory Committee next week could decide to make more than 100 brand name, over-the-counter cold and cough medicines containing the ingredient dextromethorphan available only through a doctor's prescription or place them behind the counter at pharmacies, forcing customers to receive assistance from a pharmacist or store employee to get the medicines.
When asked which substances pose the greatest negative impact on teens, teachers and police overwhelmingly identified marijuana and alcohol, followed by methamphetamine and cocaine. Additionally, no police and only 1% of high school teachers cited cough and cold medicines as having the greatest negative impact on teens.
When you think of substance abuse, which substances do you see as having the greatest negative impact on teens? Police H.S. Teachers ------------------------------------ ------ ------------- Alcohol//beer 51% 70% ------------- --- --- Marijuana//pot 69% 51% Prescription drugs//prescription pills 27% 15% -------------------------------- --- --- Methamphetamine//crystal methamphetamine 28% 9% Cocaine//coke//crack 22% 8% -------------------- --- --- Heroin 12% 3% Ecstasy 6% 5% ------- --- --- Cigarettes//tobacco 3% 6% Inhalants//spray can fumes 3% - -------------------------- --- --- Over the counter medicine//non prescription medication 1% 2% Cough//Medicines//Cold Medicines//DXM - 1%CMPI's study also shows that alcohol, marijuana, prescription drugs, methamphetamine, cocaine and cigarettes are cited among the top substances posing the most serious problems to teens:
% Selecting as Most/2(nd) Most/ 3(rd) Most Serious Problem Substance Police H.S. Teachers ----------------------------------- ------ ------------- Alcohol 82% 88% ------- --- --- Pot 76% 75% --- --- --- Prescription drugs 41% 27% ------------------ --- --- Meth 32% 22% ---- --- --- Cigarettes 14% 36% ---------- --- --- Cocaine/Crack 27% 15% ------------- --- --- Ecstasy 5% 9% ------- --- --- OTC cough and cold medicine 5% 8%
The survey also reveals that by a margin of two to one, police officers and high school teachers support education efforts as a means to address abuse of over-the-counter cough and cold medicines, versus restricted accessibility to consumers.
"Americans expect to be able to buy cough medicines conveniently at the supermarket or their neighborhood corner store," says CMPI Vice President Robert Goldberg, Ph.D. "Overly restricting access to cough and cold products containing dextromethorphan will create more health problems than it will solve, especially during cold and flu seasons. We need to find common sense solutions and invest more resources in education."
The entire Teen Substance Abuse survey is available at www.cmpi.org and the poll was conducted by Fabrizio Ward and Associates.
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