FIGHTING A COLD JUST GOT HARDER

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- If the roller-coaster temperatures of January
have left your throat constricted and nose running, be prepared to
show a photo ID and sign your name at the pharmacy.

Although law-enforcement sources here say that methamphetamine is
not very popular in the city, a relatively new federal law designed
to prevent the sale of formerly over-the-counter cold and allergy
medicines -- including Sudafed, Claritin-D, and Aleve Cold & Sinus
- -- to would-be drug cooks have created headaches for local customers.

And the thing is, the Combat Methamphetamine Epidemic Act of 2005
has a loophole big enough to drive a truck through.

The law, which took effect in September of 2006, means that ordinary
cold and allergy sufferers must present a valid photo ID, give their
name and address, and are limited to about a month's worth of
medicine every 30 days.

Most transactions are recorded in paper binders that must be
hand-checked by clerks and so far appear to be rarely inspected by
the federal Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), according to a
survey of several area pharmacies.

And because there is no computer database tracking sales in
different stores, to buy in bulk you can always just "smurf it," a
DEA spokeswoman admitted.

"That has happened, it's called 'smurfing,' where people go from
store to store," spokeswoman Erin Mulvey, of the DEA's New York
Field Division, said. "I would say (the law) is a first step."

The federal law was passed to curb what was widely labeled a "meth
epidemic" in the Midwest and Western states, because the drugs
contained in the now-restricted medicines are key ingredients in the
highly addictive stimulant. And meth labs, nine of which were found
in Manhattan and Long Island last year during a large-scale DEA
investigation dubbed "Operation Red Fusion," have a nasty habit of
exploding because of the toxic and flammable chemicals they produce.

The ingredient targeted by the law is pseudoephedrine, which gives
cold and allergy medicines their time-release property -- but is
also a key ingredient in crystal meth.

Pharmacists on Staten Island say that theft and mass-purchases of
the cold and allergy medicines were rare even before the federal law
shoved the drugs behind the counter, and police and the DEA say that
most of the crystal meth that finds its way into the city is from
rural areas, like upstate, rather than cooked here.

"I remember three years ago when I used to find empty boxes; they
would open them up and take the pills," said Matt Schwam, 20, of New
Springville, who is a clerk at the pharmacy at the Hylan Boulevard
ShopRite in New Dorp. "Not really (often), but you'd always see the
people who look suspicious in that aisle."

ShopRite, as well as larger stores like Rite Aid and CVS use the
computerized registers to automatically keep track of how often a
customer has tried to buy certain types of cold medicine. The
federal law allows 9 grams of pseudoephedrine, equivalent to a
30-tablet box of 24-hour Claritin D, per month.

At other stores, like the smaller Hylan Medicine Cabinet down the
road in Donagan Hills, clerks record names, addresses, and amounts
of the drug purchased in a paper binder. Whether a pharmacy uses a
computer system or old-fashioned paper, there is no database that
keeps track of who is buying how much cold and allergy medicine from
each store within a month.

"They get annoyed, because a lot of times they don't have an ID or
they're just running in real quick," said a pharmacist at the Rite
Aid, also on Hylan Boulevard in Donagan Hills, who wouldn't give her
name. "And then we can't sell it. It's the law."

The first time the new law led to an arrest was on March 30, 2007,
when William Fousse of Ontario, N.Y., was arrested by Rochester DEA
agents for allegedly buying 406 Bronkaid caplets -- containing a
total of over 29 grams of pseudoephedrine -- over a month's time.

Rousse was never implicated in manufacturing meth, however,
according to prosecutors quoted by local media. The 36-year-old
claimed the medicine was to cure hangovers, and he pleaded guilty to
a misdemeanor in June and was sentenced to a year of probation.

A report by the U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services
Administration that studied meth use rates between 2002 and 2005
found that only an estimated 1.4 million people, or 0.6 percent of
the population, over the age of 12 reported using meth within the
last year. All of New York state, along with New Jersey,
Massachusetts, Connecticut and Maryland, ranked at the bottom of the
list with only about 0.1 percent of the population having used the
drug; Wyoming, Nevada and Montana had the highest rate of use.

The amount of the drug seized and meth labs busted in all of New
York state have been decreasing since the law was passed, a trend
the DEA's Mulvey said is due to the new law as well as anti-meth
operations like the one that shuttered the nine in the city and Long
Island last year.

The number of meth labs reported in the state fell from 53 in 2004
to just 12 last year, and the amount of the drug seized by the DEA
dropped from 14 kilograms -- or about 31 pounds -- in 2004 to just
about 3 1/2 kilograms, or almost 8 pounds, last year.

Even if no centralized system exists to track how many pharmacies a
person visits, a drug-store industry group said that it is having a
deterrent effect on home-grown meth: Although the drug is easily
produced in countries that have no such restrictions on cold
medicines, like Mexico and Canada.

"I think the intent of the paper logbook is to let customers know
thet their information is being recorded, that there is some
record," said Kevin Nicholson, vice president of pharmacy
regulatory affairs for the National Association of Chain
Drug Stores. "It's a good law and it's working; the numbers have decreased."

If showing an ID and filling out a form is too much of a hassle,
Nicholson suggests buying cold medicines that have been reformulated
to remove the pseudoephedrine in order to stay on the shelves -- but
it won't last as long.