Environmentally Friendly Drugs?? - 2/19/07

Environmentally Friendly Drugs?? - 2/19/07
Originally uploaded by wemdoe.

So today I stopped by the pharmacy on my way home and was shocked when my routine pick of inhalers was quite different before. Namely, totally different inhaler and it costs over TWICE as much as the one I've been using all my life.

Yeah, apparently the standard albuterol inhalers are being outlawed because they are very environmentally friendly and being replaced with something more environmentally friendly. I have no problem with that, but since it is a new drug and not very common yet, of course they had no generic, so I had to pay $35 instead of $15. When I mentioned to the pharmacist that that kind of sucked, he gave me a big lecture about how I should be glad because some people were paying near $60 for just one inhaler and I was getting two for less than that and didn't I know how lucky I was?!

Yeah, I guess I was lucky before - when they were only $15.

What kind of sucks is that the pharmacists and users have until December 1, 2008 to change to the new kind, so over a year and a half. I wish I could have had the option to buy the old kind instead of having to buy the new one. Even if they are environmentally unfriendly, so is throwing away millions of unused ones....