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  • Weve all been there. Stuck with aches, pains, and runny nose, and the cough medicine in the cabinet is five years old.

  • The question is, do you take it and risk it? Or toss it and suffer?

  • Hey pill poppers Julia here for DNews.

  • Weve talked on DNews before about food expirations dates or "sell by" dates as theyre sometimes called.

  • And weve found well...there is less actual rules and more like guidelines.

  • Most food lasts well beyond that date. Others, well you have do a quick sniff test.

  • But have you ever noticed that medication has an expiration date too?

  • Rachael Lee asked us, "Can you get sicker from expired medicine?"

  • The FDA started slapping an expiration date on medicines in 1979.

  • So it’s been over 30 years since that decision, and has it made a difference?

  • Typically the expiration date is set a year to five years beyond the date of manufacture.

  • It’s less of an expiration date and more of a date of guaranteed potency.

  • Basically after that date, manufacturers can’t guarantee the drug will be 100% potent, it doesn’t necessarily mean it will be unsafe or less effective.

  • But there’s some evidence that some medicines can hold their potency for quite awhile especially in controlled conditions.

  • A study conducted by the FDA on behalf of the Military found ways to extend the life of medicines in storage in a program called SLEP or shelf life extension program.

  • They found that they could extend the life of 88% of the drugs in government facilities by at least a year by simply keeping them in climate controlled storage.

  • Most drugs lasted on average five and half years past the expiration date.

  • While civilians like you and I might not have access to tightly controlled storage facilities, there’s always the fridge, which some experts recommend a cool, dry place, for extending the life of your medication.

  • But maybe drugs last longer than five years even without chilling in the Fed’s fridge.

  • One study published in the journal Archives of Internal Medicine found that some medicines can hold their own for decades.

  • In this study, all the drugs were all 28-40 years past their due date.

  • They only looked at a handful of medicines, 8 different medications with about 15 different compounds between them like caffeine, aspirin, or hydrocodone.

  • They found that most, 12 of those compounds remained in amounts of at least 90% decades after their expiration date.

  • And that 90% is crucial, that’s how much of the good stuff a drug needs to be considered "effective" by the FDA.

  • So most of the decades old medicine didn’t break down or lose it’s potency.

  • Although two medicines, aspirin and amphetamine, seem to lose some of their juice after all that time.

  • They were present in amounts less than 90%.

  • But before you go popping grandma’s pills, which you shouldn’t take anyone else's pills anywaysthat’s illegal.

  • But really the FDA recommends listening to those expiration dates.

  • They caution that drugs gone bad could be "less effective or risky due to a change in chemical composition or decrease in potency."

  • FDA pharmacist, Ilisa Bernstein, straight up says "If your medicine has expired, do not use it."

  • Especially with life-saving drugs like an EpiPen.

  • If a drug’s expired, the FDA recommends tossing it.

  • The best way to dispose of a drug is usually on the bottle or some cities have prescription medicine take back programs.

  • So look into that if youre worried about all the leftover medication in your bathroom cabinet.

  • So it seems drugs last longer than their "good by" date, but at the end of the day I’d still listen to the FDA just to be on the safe side.

  • But it’s not just medicines that expire, there’s lots of common things you didn’t know have an expiration date.

  • Trace has the whole list of things in your house that go bad, right here.

  • Bleach is what is being used by the CDC in their labs and it has an expiration date of only six months from the day of manufacture.

  • So like, 3-5 months once you get it home.

  • So have you ever used expired medicine before? noticed anything weird? Tell us about it down in the comments below. And thanks Rachel for your question.

  • If you guys have any more questions that you'd like us to answer here on DNews, submit words down below.

  • Don't forget to hit those like and subscribe button to keep coming back to DNews, so you don't miss a single episode.

Weve all been there. Stuck with aches, pains, and runny nose, and the cough medicine in the cabinet is five years old.

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