Does a third-class or pharmacy-only system work?
The U.S. Government Accountability Office examined other nations’ experience with a third class of drugs, or pharmacy class, in 1995 and again in 2009. In the 2009 report, the GAO said “we did not find an association between the restrictions place on the availability of particular drugs in our sample by the study countries and the presence of a behind-the-counter drug class. The United States gave more restrictive classification to some drugs and less restrictive classification to other drugs when compared to the other four study countries.” In its 1995 final report to Congress, the GAO concluded that “the evidence . . . tends to undermine the contention that major benefits are being obtained in countries with a pharmacist or pharmacy only class.”Many countries are slowly expanding access beyond pharmacies to some nonprescription medicines. Japan, the Netherlands, Denmark, Italy, the United Kingdom, and Argentina all have been part of a trend toward granting consumers greater access to
