LessO2

Yeah, I drove a friend of mine to the airport last week. He was a little panicked about this 4 oz. bottle of Purell he had. He was not aware of the Freedom Baggie thing, and was worried about getting through.

I told him that he can just put it in his pocket and get through with no problem. He was surprised that it's so easy like that.

I picked him up last night; he told me that he was randomly selected to go through the 'puffer.' Never got stopped for that Purell.

Still had to take his shoes off after going through the puffer, though.

Solarmoon

How long before some creative student makes DoctorsNote.com which allows you to enter your prescribed medication in exchange for a printable "Doctor's Note", purely for purposes of artistic expression and political commentary, of course! What are they going to do? Demand anti-counterfeiting watermarked paper and verifiable numbered pads? Require us all to have RFIDs in the notes? Require cross-validation with a national medication-dosage database?

These kinds of unreasonable restrictions just make the public grow cynical and reduces the respect for law in this country. A lot of things work well in the USA because they are built on an assumption of mutual trust and respect. The TSA needs to consider this in whatever cost/benefit analyses they do to justify all this nonsense.

txrus

Given that prescription pads literally come in all shapes, sizes, & colors, having a 'prescription' means zilch. The ONLY way to catch a phony script is to present it to the ordering MD & ask him/her if that's his/her signature & even then, that's not 100% as most MDs allow their office staff, residents, fellows, nurses, etc., to sign their names for expediency; the only possible exception being for narcotics, but even then, I wouldn't bet on it. (The pad that's in my desk, btw, is green )

ladysoleil

Two reasons I can think of why you shouldn't, although it was a helpful suggestion so I'm not flaming you or anything.

One- screeners have been incorrectly confiscating travel bottles at some airports. I know this to be true, as it happened to me personally at EWR.

Two- Most sunscreens aren't photostable (they are sensitive to light/degrade under direct lighting). That's why they are mostly sold in opaque packaging. Most of the travel bottles I've seen are transparent or translucent, so it's not good to leave sunscreen in them. If your sunblock breaks down in the container, it's not going to protect *you*. Which defeats the purpose.

I'm not a chemist so I couldn't tell you how long it would take to ruin the product in an improper container, but I know a fair amount of stuff 'bout sunblock because I'm at very high risk for skin cancer and am also allergic to most chemical sunblocks that are commercially available.

Luckily for me, I was able to find my really difficult to find Vanicream sunblock in a 1 oz sample size and put a few tubes in my Freedom Baggie. I was not able to bring on my illegal UK sunblock, but left it in my checked baggage. Fortunately it made the trip in one piece. If it hadn't made it over, well, I wouldn't have been outside much during our cruise, I'll put it that way.

And thanks for mentioning the sunlight through the plane windows thing. I'll confess to being stupid because it never occurred to me that it might be a problem! (d'oh.) I generally keep the shades down and sleep anyway, but next time I'll remember to reapply during the flight.

I also get sun protective clothing from Coolibar (.com) and Solarveil (.com). As someone else noted, the TSA can't confiscate that.

GUWonder

And how does the TSA deal with foreign issued prescriptions?

I feel sorry for all the elderly foreigners visiting family in the US who will be stripped of their medication in their carry-ons because the government can't get its act together and instead resorts to knee-jerk overreactions.

msrohud

I have to chime in here. I don't believe this has been posted, but check out the numbers from the CDC (last numbers I could find from 2002):

http://www.cdc.gov/cancer/nscpep/about2004.htm

"In 2002,*
• 48,249 people in the United States were diagnosed with skin cancer, 27,268 of them men and 20,981 of them women.
• 45,193 white people and 3,056 non-white people in the United States were diagnosed with skin cancer.
That same year,
• 9,904 people in the United States died of skin cancer, 6,371 of them men and 3,533 of them women.
• 9,569 white people and 335 non-white people in the United States died of skin cancer.
Epidemiologic data suggest that skin cancers can be prevented if children, adolescents, and adults are protected from UV radiation."

From the OP, he has already stated that he has had issues with skin cancer. Who is the TSA to say that skin cancer is not a medical, non-prescription issue? Of course, it's nice to say in retrospect that the OP should have had a note from his doctor (and more than likely will next time), but he did declare the sunscreen as is "required" according to the TSA website.

While the number of people who die from skin cancer in the US may not be huge, please feel free to sit in the waiting room of a skin cancer surgical unit and pray that your loved one isn't one of the "few". You'll also see how skin cancer can cause significant disfiguration.

Off my soapbox now.

n5667

Those supervisors can allow whatever they want through in terms of liquids, the rules state that.

A simple ETD of the medication should have sufficed with a reminder to bring additional documentation...

However, at our airport prescription medication that has the patient's name on it is completely fine so long as said patient furnishes identification.

I would have escalated things to a manager before surrendering cancer medication... And by medication, we're not talking about "alternative" juniper berry syrup medication are we?..

Spiff

The OP has established that this was not prescription pot.

KleineFrau

*snicker*

frink

Are you an oncologist? No?

frink

I really don't understand the mentality that people should get (be forced to to avoid the TSSSSA) "doctor's notes" for OTC drugs. My emphasis in bold below.

From the FDA's site:

Over-the-counter (OTC) drugs play an increasingly vital role in America's health care system. OTC drug products are those drugs that are available to consumers without a prescription. There are more than 80 therapeutic categories of OTC drugs, ranging from acne drug products to weight control drug products. As with prescription drugs, CDER oversees OTC drugs to ensure that they are properly labeled and that their benefits outweigh their risks.

OTC drugs generally have these characteristics:

* their benefits outweigh their risks
* the potential for misuse and abuse is low
* consumer can use them for self-diagnosed conditions
* they can be adequately labeled
* health practitioners are not needed for the safe and effective use of the product

Wouldn't telling me that I can't have OTC sunscreen still fall into praciticing medicine without a license (on the part of the TSA)? I diagnose myself to live in a part of the country (the Southwest) where skin cancer is a very real threat. I choose to medicate myself with whatever damned sunscreen I want.

Ignoring sunscreen for a moment, if I decide that I need a big bottle of Pepto to counteract that hangover I got yesterday or that bad fish I had last night, what right does the TSA have to take it away from me, period?*

* Irrespective of whether I'm a good sheep and baa at the front of the line to tell them that I have 4oz of Pepto in my bag or whether I'm a bad sheep and smuggle it in my bag and they catch me.

At least in the case of OTC drugs, I am my own doctor. Should I write myself a note?

red456

Yes, you should. Why not? TSA plays by their rules; you play by yours.

Cookie Jarvis

I do agree with you that this liquid/gel ban is totally unnecessary. Absolutely, without a doubt.

BUT..... since this is the way that it is, and Stimpy stated that he NEEDED this sunscreen to control his skin cancer, he should have taken a more pro-active approach in order to benefit himself. He had everything to gain by following the rules, and much to lose by not following the rules. Sometimes we need to be The Master of Own Destiny.

Spiff

Where does it end?

"You could have avoided this beating, Citizen, had you filled out your paperwork."

Teacher49

^ Exactly.


We can be conditioned - hell, are being conditioned - to accept loss of privacy, of dignity, of our rights in order not to miss that plane we have to catch. Peer pressure in security lines also makes all move like sheep through the process obeying rules that make no sense whatsoever and which strip us of our freedom to live in a place where we are suppose to only have to obey rules that are not foolish or arbitrary.