Online pharmacies - is it legal to buy prescription meds online?

I'm constantly reading about online pharmacies and how cheap they are but no one I ask can answer the question - is it legal to buy prescription meds in this way?

I'm talking about meds like sleeping XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX. My friend is on them long-term with chronic insomnia (has tried umpteen other types of treatment in conjuction with her doctor) and has a repeat prescription for them, among other meds for other conditions. The total cost per month comes in just under the DPS allowance of €78 per month, so it's a big drain every month on her finances.

She's afraid to buy online in case the Gardai arrive at her door waving a warrant, particulary as she'd be buying XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX that would have street value, I suppose.

If it's ok to buy this way, do you send your prescription with the order and can anyone recommend a secure, above-board site to use?

Thanks a mil.

Hi Sophia2457,

I think it may be illegal to buy from e-pharmacies....

Read this ;

[broken link removed]

It is illegal to supply medicines by mail order, i.e. the supplier (and anyone who facilitates them by, for example, providing the office building from which they process orders) is committing an offence.

It is not strictly speaking illegal to get medicines by mail order, i.e. your friend would not be committing the offence although the supplier would.

HOWEVER, if her medicine is also controlled under the Misuse of Drugs Acts and Regulations (and if it's a drug that has street value, it probably is), then it's illegal for her to possess it unless she's received it on a valid prescription, and a prescription that's been written for the purpose of getting something by mail order is not considered to be legally valid. So she could be done for illegal possession, not specifically the fact she got it by mail order. [This only applies to controlled products, not all products.]

Also, would you be happy to get medicines from someone who knowingly breaks the law by supplying stuff illegally?

By the way, the monthly DPS limit is now €85, not €78.

But if she's spending, say, €70 per month on meds, she'd be well over the limit for getting tax back on this, especially considering her GP fees as well, and particularly if she (or her spouse if she's a dependent) is in the higher tax bracket.
Say €70 x 12 = €840 per year.
Substract the tax threshhold of €125 giving €715.
42% tax back on €715 = €300.30. (More if you throw in GP fees.)

Unlikely she'd make that much of a saving from internet purchase - if she did, I'd be worried about what she was receiving.
(I doubt she'd get tax back on internet purchase since it was from an illegal supplier.)

Thanks, cobalt, I'll pass all that great info on.

Surely then people mustn't be using these online places to buy meds if they don't make much savings and it's illegal to possess some meds without a valid prescription?

I mean, I'd worry that the cops would show up at my door saying, you bought sleeping tablets from this site that's been raided or whatever - we have your records here so you must have them in your possession illegally...etc.

Why do we never hear of people being in trouble for this? Surely it must be seen by the Gardai as a way of importing drugs for re-sale easily? Very strange.

We get tons of spam in work from online pharmacies, yet you never hear of warnings about the illegality of buying stuff like tranquillisers or sleeping tablets. And I bet lots of people are buying them - a way to bypass the doctor!

Sophia2457 said:

The total cost per month comes in just under the DPS allowance of €85 per month, so it's a big drain every month on her finances.

Click to expand...

You can claim tax relief on the cost of prescriptions (and on all other qualifying medical expenses bar first €125) at your marginal rate, (potentially 42%) by filling out a MED1 form. And the balance over €85 per month is paid by your local health authority under the Drug Payment Scheme (DPS). So it shouldn't be such a big strain on one's finances.

there was a lot of publicity a few months back about the contents/ ingedients of some medicines available on line. many not reputable.

hi sophia
sorry about your friends problem
some responses to your query say it is illegal or you will get inferior products
firstly i dont think it is illegal and you certainly wont have gardai on your doorstep
and the drugs are usually of the requied standard_in your friends case she will soon see if the drugs are helping her sleep
drugs in pharmacies in spain or greece are much cheaper than in ireland so clearly there are savings
you don,t need a prescription_maybe a questionaire
you,ll need a credit card
best plan is to type the name of the drug your friend is using into the search box in your computer_many online firms will appear _go thru them and see how good a deal they offer
some make their products in india etc but thats fine

sophia - be *very* carefull about taking positive advice in this regard. In the last post sunrock says your friend "will soon see if the drugs are helping her sleep", but the flipside of that is that your friend may end up poisoned or dead if the wrong drugs were dispatched.

If you met some bloke on the street who offered to sell you whatever drugs you wanted dead cheap would you simply trust that his quality was up to scratch - I imagine the answer to that is no. If he was well dressed would you trust him any more ? Hopefully the answer is no . . . similarly, just because someone has a flash website doesn't make their drugs any good.

I am *no fan* of Irish pharmacy prices at all and have posted before about what appear to be the unduly high prices charged and lack of transparency in pricing, but I would trust an Irish pharmacist a lot more than I would trust a virtual pharmacist of unknown location, unknown quality, unknown everything.

If looking for a low cost supply of a known drug (and preferably which has already been prescribed) I would suggest finding a *reputable* existing supplier with a physical presence and more that a few years track record.

z

Saw a documentary recently about the type of drugs that one can buy unwittingly on line and the people supplying. Suffice to say after watching that I would be very wary of buying on-line. If prescriptions are much cheaper in other countries in Europe would your friend consider a Ryan Air cheap flight to France or Spain to pick up some from a real pharmacy- even go to a GP there to get the prescription if necessary. We go over to France quite often to relatives and we've been to GPs there a few times ( children!) and they even give you a form to claim back the tax at home. I couldnt say if prescriptions are cheaper over there since anything we have ever bought was just a one-off.

hi again sophia
on re reading your query you mention "street value" of the sleeping tablets
i presume you are trying to help your friend and are not doing anything with the purpose of resale i.e. that you are totally sincere
online pharmacies don,t supply drugs of an illegal nature
and the drugs are not that cheap
a lot of the drugs are made in places like india
some are made under licence ie original drugs ,others generic _same drug made maybe using a different process
i think to say you could be poisoned is scaremongering
ideally one should be able to get pharmacy drugs thru the irish health system_doctor prescription_local pharmacy etc
however for some due to financial or other reasons the irish system is problematic
the on line pharmacy offers an alternative

LOL no, sunrock, I'm not about to go selling drugs on the street! I'd hardly be posting on here as a 'learner dealer'. My question is genuine and if I knew a garda personally I'd ask him.

My pal isn't into the net so I said I'd ask the question here for her because I've found it a pretty knowledgeable site. I've got some very good advice from posing the question and enjoyed the responses and different viewpoints.

I take your warning, zag, well-illustrated too.
Anyway, I wouldn't know who was a 'reputable' existing supplier with a phyical presence (online I mean) or how to check their track record.

Vanilla - good suggestion too tho she didn't take to it. She was on holiday in Malta two years ago and lost her sleeping tablets (bag went missing). Went to a doctor recommended by the hotel and was told that she would have to be seen by a psychiatrst before she could be prescribed any form of sleeping pill, anti-depressant or drug of that nature. She was treated like an addict and it was a bad experience.

I believe she had to contact her doctor back home and get him to contact the doctor there and write him a letter...etc. They obviously have very strict guidelines there and she'd hate to chance being made feel like that again. Mind you, the visit to the doc only cost a fiver!

as i said to you before sophia you know the drug the doc prescribed and the dosage andthe cost
type the drug name into the search box on your computer and the online pharmacies will appear
at least you can browse learn and compare
no point in asking a garda _ unlikely to know
if it was a grey area the worst that could happen is customs seizure which is a slight possibility
if the customs did seize your delivery you might be caught for vat
the process of ordering and paying by credit card is straightforward

I could not see a problem if the OP has a prescription from an Irish doctor but chose to have it filled offshore. The OP would still be ok in possessing the drugs.

Knowing the drug and the cost has no bearing on whether the online pharmacy is actually supplying what you want. There are a large number of very dodgy online pharmacies whose drugs are at best going to do nothing, and at worst cause you serious harm.

The German consumer magazine TEST gave good marks to the following online pharmacies , which they tested.
Two where I saw an english language button
[broken link removed]=


Some where you may need your Deutsch
http://mycare.de/
http://www.versandapo.de/ oho! postage €20- for Irl
http://apotheke-am-rothenbaum.savit.de/
http://www.shop-apotheke.com/
http://www.europa-apotheek.de/

A very popular one https://www.docmorris.de/de/ got poor marks for their online advice but great marks for Order / Delivery and Website .

The reason I posted these is that they were checked by Stiftungwarentest , which is thorough and reliable ( typical German).
PJQ

I[m slightly confused about the suggestions from some posters that buying pharmaceuticals on-line is illegal. I work in a hospital and recently when I deplored how expensive supplements such as St. John's Wort were in the high-street health stores my SRN (nurse) colleagues suggested getting these on-line or through one of the many mail-order firms as they were much more competitive.

When I explored this and compared the high-street products with the online/mail-order equivalents I found the lower price of the on-line/mail-order is illusory as they are often of lower strength.

Hi Marie
I was concerned that it would be illegal to buy online as the meds concerned are prescription-only meds, not over the counter ones.

Anyway, you can't buy St. John's Wort in health store in Ireland - it was taken off a couple of years ago. I think it's still available in England.

Thanks pjq - will check out those urls.

My sister had just ordered meds she's been on for over 10 years (and will be for forseeable future) online without prescription.

Is this legal in Ireland? The pharmacy is based is USA and was recommended to her. I just wondered if she had broken the law and could get in trouble if they're traced to her. She got them much cheaper and hopefully they'll be the real thing.

Hope you can help, I'm a bit worried on both counts.

Something else to be aware of if you order online.....I almost ordered some medication from the USA last year, entered some details (including an email address) but decided not to proceed. Had to close down my email address within 2 months, was bombarded by spam...as I hadn't used that email address much elsewhere, I can only assume they got my address from that site (can't remember what it is, sadly!).

I've ordered from [broken link removed] when I had particular difficulty filling my prescription from pharmacies here (the item was being discontinued). Delivery very fast, within 14 days, it comes from the South Pacific, and I was highly amused to find that the medication I couldn't get here, ordered from the other side of the world, was Made In Ireland!!!

Hi, Just sos not to start a new thread.

Mate of mine ordered sleeping XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX without a prescription (although they have gotten prescriptions in the past). Just got a note from customs saying that they are investigating under the customs and excise act whether or not:

-were imported either without payment of any duty payable thereon or in contravention of any prohibition or restriction on the importation thereof;

-are being or are intended to be exported either without payment of any duty payable thereon or in contravention of any prohibition or restriction on the exportation thereof;

-and whether or not the conveyance was made use of in the importation of the said goods.

Now is this just legal jargon for "you bought goods and didnt pay VAT on them". Or this there something else being said?

For the sake of my friends sanity (they tried phoning up the customs office which has been busy all afternoon!) could somebody please clarify if they are in trouble with the garda. Seems to be conflicting opinions here.

Also the company with whom they bought the drugs, have already resent them the same order again (they have a guarantee policy that they reship any confiscated goods by customs), is there any repurcussions to these being confiscated (anything more then just not receiving the goods!)

Is the main issue that they bought prescription goods without a prescription or that they didnt pay VAT on it. I assume that this means when you buy goods on online websites (amazon etc) you automatically pay VAT? )