http://www.dailygazette.com

Quoted Text

Buying cold medicine? Meth cops may know about it
BY SAMIRA JAFARI The Associated Press

   LONDON, Ky. — Detective Brian Lewis returns to his desk after lunch, scanning e-mails he missed.
   One catches his eye: It says a suspected member of a methamphetamine ring bought a box of Sudafed at 1:34 p.m. at a CVS pharmacy.
   Minutes later, Lewis is in his truck, circling the parking lot, searching for the woman.
   Lewis did not find her that day, but the scenario illustrates the way law enforcement is increasingly relying on computerized tracking systems in their fight against meth, an illegal drug that is often brewed in makeshift labs and has become a particular scourge in Appalachia and the Midwest.
   Tracking systems are gradually being installed in pharmacies nationwide in response to a federal law that, since March 2006, has regulated purchases of pseudoephedrine, a key ingredient in the manufacture of meth. Pseudoephedrine is found in many over-the-counter cold and allergy medicines, such as Sudafed.
   Under federal law, customers must show photo ID to buy pseudoephedrine, and the legal limit for purchases is 9 grams per month — roughly the equivalent of two 15-dose boxes of 24-hour Claritin D, or three 10-dose boxes of Aleve Cold & Sinus, or six 24-dose boxes of Sudafed.
   Tracking systems like the one in use in Kentucky, MethCheck, automatically collect the buyer’s name, address and age with a swipe of a driver’s license or stateissued ID card.
   Then the system notifies detectives via e-mail when a customer has exceeded the purchase limit. It also allows law enforcement to quickly spot suspicious patterns — for example, someone who might be trying to skirt the purchase limits by going from pharmacy to pharmacy and buying a few packages at a time.
   An updated version of Meth-Check eventually will enable law enforcement to track purchases by neighborhood or street. That could help detectives spot instances in which a meth chemist enlists others in the neighborhood to buy pseudoephedrine for him, Lewis said.
   In addition, the system can flag purchases by people already under suspicion among law enforcement authorities.
   Kentucky is the first state to use MethCheck; it has been testing it out in Laurel County since mid-2005. MethCheck will be used at some 7,000 pharmacies in 43 states by next year, said Rick Jones, spokesman for Louisville-based Appriss Inc., which developed MethCheck.
   Lewis, who heads the MethCheck initiative at Operation UNITE, a federally funded drug task force in Kentucky, said he has used the system to build cases against dozens of people.
   Consumer privacy watchdogs are troubled by the technology, worrying that people with colds or allergies could come under suspicion for unwittingly exceeding the purchasing limits by stocking up for themselves or family members. That has happened to at least eight people in Kentucky, according to Lewis.
   “People’s health information — it’s intimate, it’s personal, it’s something people desperately want to keep private,” said Beth Wilson, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union in Kentucky. “For law enforcement to do an investigation, there must be a reasonable suspicion. I’m not sure just the amount of medication justifies that.”
   Authorities said evidence from MethCheck only leads to preliminary interviews with police and is not enough to warrant an arrest.
   “It’s just an investigative tool,” said Van Ingram of the Kentucky Office of Drug Control Policy. “During the course of any investigation, you’re sometimes going to interview people who aren’t guilty of wrongdoing but who are part of the investigative process.”
   CVS, the nation’s largest pharmacy chain, is participating in the voluntary Kentucky program and plans to install MethCheck in most of its 6,200 stores across the country by the fall.
   “We wanted to make sure we were in compliance [with federal law] and have a solution that would be the least time-consuming for our customers and easiest for employees,” CVS spokesman Mike DeAngelis said
   Arkansas started testing out another program, called Leads on Labs, in North Little Rock pharmacies last year.
   The nation’s largest retailer, Wal-Mart, said it is working to develop its own tracking system.
   In Kentucky, the goal is to have some sort of electronic tracking in all of the state’s 1,290 pharmacies by the fall, at a cost estimated at up to $500,000. Under state law, pharmacies must employ electronic tracking if the state foots the bill.
   Drugstore customers “put up a little bit of a fuss,” said Amanda Hall, a pharmacy technician at a Kroger supermarket in London. “It’s usually the legitimate ones who think they’re being picked out of a crowd, but they’re not.”

Hello Big Brother.

They are illegal drug dealers/cookers.....do we really think they use their own address, phone # or SS#????....the laws will drive them underground further and to seek out other law abiding citizens identities......brilliant....just brilliant......everyone say, altogether now: "at least they are doing something".......cause really,,that's all we have is the 'at least'........

The drug/cookers dealers can't buy them anymore because the cold medicine is behind the counter so they'll just resort to stealing them at gun point.

I was in the CVS at the 5 corners a couple of weeks ago. I was standing in line to pay for my stuff and there was one person in front of me. It was and obvioiusly adult male who was purchasing cold medicine. The clerk behind the counter took out this huge book and asked the customer for his licience. The clerk wrote all his information down in this huge book. When it was my turn to pay, I asked the clerk what they were doing. The clerk then explained that they keep a record of certain cold medicines purchased and by whom. That was the first time I ever saw of heard of that.

Yes, it's any drug that you want to buy that contains pseudoephedrine (Sudafed).  In fact, you'll notice, if you go to the aisle for the cold medicines that there are some Sudafed products there.  They contain phenylephrine, a substitute decongestant.  That's right, the stuff you would actually get in the aisle doesn't even include pseudoephedrine, even under the name Sudafed.  Even drugs such as DayQuil and NyQuil have been changed to used this new decongestant.

This started with having to change it over a couple years ago.  

Just stand over a steaming hot vapor bath and blow your nose.....These drugs exist so we can keep getting into our cars, go to work-to keep up production/or whatever and,,,,,be happy......"I am having a good day. It is a good thing I have these drugs to help me. My body seems to take too long to feel better.",,,,,,,,,,