Recently in the news: the morning after pill will be available over the counter to under 17-year-olds. It got me to thinking. Trouble, I know.

On the one hand, having any drug available over the counter makes it convenient; you don't need a doctor’s prescription to get it, and you don’t need to feel like anyone… including your parents…need to know what you are doing. And I would be 100% for this, except for one thing: people aren’t taught about risks of any over the counter (OTC) medicines they take. They don’t get an automatic pharmacist’s counsel on OTC drugs, and most people don’t have a knowledgeable friend or family member who can warn them about risks. And when it does occur to someone to look up risks on the internet, the information found can be confusing or untrustworthy.

My mom was in the pharmaceutical industry for many years. I learned from her that ibuprofen was excellent for menstrual cramps. And because I am curious and I read labels, I learned that ibuprofen is the generic name for the active drug found in both Motrin and Advil. So I knew to only take one of those drugs at a time, or risk having too much.

Some people aren’t so lucky. Like the person in the news years ago who took the maximum dose of both Tylenol and Co-Tylenol, not realizing he was doubling his dose of acetaminophen, a drug that can cause liver failure at higher doses.

Despite my background, I was not informed enough to understand everything about OTC drugs. I was reminded of this one night in college when I felt a cold coming on and I took two Co-Tylenol before bed. I naively expected the medicine to nip the cold in the bud (essentially expecting allopathic medicine to act like homeopathic medicine). Instead I was kept awake half the night because of the stimulant pseudoephedrine hydrochloride, which was in there as an antihistamine.

All this got me to thinking: wouldn’t it be nice if high schoolers were taught about OTC drugs? It wouldn’t have to be a semester long class. It could just be part of the health unit, or it could just be an hour long seminar and a handout. It wouldn’t even necessarily be part of the school curriculum, but it could be something you could sign your kid up for, much like some parents sign their kid up for a class in Internet safety.

Or should we just trust that people will read the package inserts and Google any medicine they are taking in order to find out its risks? Personally, I don’t think so. Medical information on the internet seems to come in three flavors:

--too hard for a lay person to understand, but generally the most accurate, like http://www.wikipedia.org/.

--moderately easy to understand, like http://www.about.com

--super easy to understand, but least likely to be accurate, like http://answers.yahoo.com

After spending ten years doing technical support for software, I know that many people don’t read the information that comes with the products they buy. Many don’t like doing web searches or posting questions on forums either. They want to talk to a real person. Having a class would really help give young people a good foundation in understanding the risks and benefits of OTC drugs.

Now here’s the point where I step back and poke holes in my own argument. If you are like a good number of people, you may read what I’ve written here and assume I’m one of those liberals who think that people need to be treated like babies who don’t know what’s good for them. And you’d be correct…partly. I am one of those bleeding heart liberals. I love people for their inherent value as sentient beings, and want them to be happy. The trouble comes when my idea of what will lead to others’ happiness conflicts with their own. So I may think that if you get knowledge about the dangers of something, that you will use that knowledge to the benefit of your own health, and when you have good health, you have one brick in the fortress of happiness. In that regard, I think I am helping but you may not agree. So it goes. Namaste!