Stellar Snippets
CVS will be removing most common cough and cold medicines in its stores and will no longer sell them after a Food and Drug Administration (FDA) ruling.
Last month, the FDA unanimously agreed that the main ingredient in many popular over-the-counter oral allergy and cold meds doesn't clear nasal congestion.
The FDA had not yet asked companies to stop making and selling products containing oral phenylephrine present in NyQuil, Benadryl, Sudafed and Mucinex.
CVS is voluntarily pulling only those cold and cough medicines that contain phenylephrine as the only active ingredient, like Sudafed PF by Kenvue.
It will continue selling other cold and cough medicines. However, removing these products entirely would seriously affect retail pharmacy revenues.
In 2022, U.S. stores sold 242 million bottles (up by 30% in 2021) of phenylephrine-containing drugs worth $1.8 billion in sales, according to FDA data.
From the patients' perspective, not everyone is comfortable with or is advised to use liquid versions of nasal decongestants.
This move will force the patients to use the liquid or spray versions or get entirely new prescriptions to relieve nasal congestion.