Is expired pseudoephedrine still effective or dangerous to take?

Answer 1

For most drugs, the labeling is the manufacturer's guarantee and not the actual expiration date. For liability reasons, manufacturers are required to put a date to which the following criteria are met: 1) the drug is still safe to take (i.e. no increased side effects than the original studies imply, no added or new side effects) 2) the drug is still retains 90% effectiveness as of the day it was made. Most drugs after the expiration date are returned to the manufacturer or distribution and many of them are actually repackaged with a new brand and new expiration date due to the actual expiratory data that the manufacturers have. Some drugs however do form toxic metabolites (i.e. tetracycline, opioids) or loses its effectiveness significantly (liquid formulations, opioids, nitroglycerin etc) that it is not recommended to use after the expiration date (1 or 2 days to a few weeks may still be good since they really can't go from effective to ineffective or non toxic to toxic over night). Pseudoephedrine has a very long shelf life unless continually exposed to oxidative process such as heat and air. So in its original packaging in the 'foil' pseudoephedrine should last a long time.