Local drug war

Here is a press release Police Chief Sean Wallace sent out, which is what he said to a state senate committee last week. They want to make the drug pseudoephedrine a prescription only medication. This is the essential drug in allergy medicine that you can now get without a prescription.
A box of this costs around $5, and it is used for making meth. it is also used by people who have allergies.
If it were a prescription only med, you would have to have a doctor  visit and get a prescription, so the cost - including the doctors visit, would be around $50 if you dont have insurance, and probably $15-$20 if you do have insurance.
I know this drug is abused to make illicit drugs, but ... this is punishing the citizenry for the actions of a few. Wallace feels this would prevent meth-makers from getting the drug. So how hard would it be for them to go get a doctors prescription? All they would have to do is sneeze a bit for the doc.... and pay a little more than they pay now...
I do at least agree with Wallace that we need to let our state senators know what we think of this bill.
:)
below is what Wallace sent out:



I am in full support of  SB131which proposes to make pseudoephedrine a prescription only drug.  Chief Dan Parker of Winfield Police Department and I are both located in Cowley County and our agencies are part of a countywide drug task force along with Sheriff D uld add that affect the safety, health, and the crime rate of our perspective cities.

When pseudoephedrine was first required to be kept behind the counter in July of 2004, we saw a drop in Methamphetamine labs and sales in our county.  However, the “tunnel vision” addiction of Meth led the users to problem solve ways to acquire pseudoephedrine in spite of the restrictions and resume methamphetamine production.  The method “smurphs” are using to finance the purchase of pseudoephedrine has caused our theft and burglary rate to sore.  The “smurphs” steal scrap metal, copper from air conditioners, and commit other burglaries and thefts to acquire the funds to purchase pseudoephedrine legitimately.  The “Smurphs” then fan out to the various stores in our jurisdiction and buy their limit of pseudoephedrine and meth production continues.  These methods used by “smurphs” have increased methamphetamine production in Cowley Co. and now 30% of the drug crime we investigate is methamphetamine related. 

The current controls on pseudoephedrine may be working statewide but are not working in southeast Kansas and further steps are needed to curb meth production.   Logs are great, but many pharmacies employee minimum wage workers at their counters and they are not diligent to verify ID cards and driver’s licenses.  Corporate pharmacies keep electronic logs but like all transactions at these type of stores, transactions are done with electronic readers and signature pads that the clerk never views so purchasers of pseudoephedrine can write anything.  If Kansas strengthens the current restrictions to include requiring pseudoephedrine  to be on the same computerized tracking network it still will not prevent “smurphs” from funding their efforts by theft and from going out in force and buying up their limit of pseudoephedrine at the over the counter drug providers in our jurisdiction.  If pseudoephedrine is prescription only, no amount of thefts and mobilization on their part will allow them to obtain the product.