Do prescription drugs really need expiration dates or is it just another ploy to extract more cash from an unsuspecting public? If you are taking any kind of medication, you probably have noticed that your prescription medication includes an expiration date as well as directions for use. And if you are taking any type of medication on a regular basis, you may have wondered why there are expiration dates on prescription drugs.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has required all pharmaceutical companies to label their drugs with an expiration date since 1979. Though the expiration date does not necessarily indicate that a drug is unsafe for use, it is supposedly in place for the safety of the consumer. For most medications, the expiration date is around two years after the drug is manufactured.

Though an expiration date is included on all prescription drugs, this does mean it is unsafe or even less effective. There has been widespread disagreement, even among experts, on whether prescription drugs past their expiration dates are still safe once they have expired. Some even seem to believe that expiration dates are simply a scare tactic used to the benefit of the pharmaceutical manufacturers. After all, statistics indicate that the elderly population is on track to spending 113.6 billion dollars per year on prescriptions by the year 2010.

Since there has been no concrete evidence that drugs are less effective after their expiration dates and spending on prescription seems to be exploding, consumers and regulators have begun to question why there are expiration dates on prescription drugs. Well, obviously, since drugs are chemically based, there must be a shelf life. So expiration dates are not necessarily a negative. They are actually a safeguard for the consumer.

However, the real question is not really why there are expiration dates on prescription drugs, but rather why there has not been any testing to establish true expiration dates for prescriptions. In the year 2000, legislation addressed this very issue and adopted Resolution 527, which urges the American Medical Association to pressure the FDA and pharmaceutical companies to evaluate the effectiveness of expiration dates.

What this means is that since all drugs are different, expiration dates for each should be determined individually. After all, no two chemicals have the same properties, so expiration dates should not be a 'one size fits all' solution. Each drug should be evaluated on a case by case basis.

The current drug expiration system is flawed and overwhelmingly benefits (financially) the pharmaceutical companies, which is why expiration dates remain a sore spot with consumers. No one wants to take a potentially dangerous drug so expiration dates are necessary. However, consumers are merely advocating an end to the abuse of the system.