Question by Shay D: What really happens when vitamins, prescription meds or over-the-counter drugs reach their expiration date?
I have heard nothing happens and it’s just a marketing scam or that it may lose it’s potency. Anyone really know what that date on the bottle is really for? Is it dangerous to take anything after the date on the bottle?
Best answer:
Answer by carobygirl
What happens is that the drug companies who make them are not responsible if you get very sick from taking them. Expiration dates are there to protect you. The meds don’t go bad on that day, but you have no way of knowing when they actually will go bad.
What do you think? Answer below!
March 21, 2011 at 10:16 am
The drug corporations who set these expiration dates can no longer be rightfully sued by you for an unsafe or ineffective product.
In most cases nothing much happens, the expiration date is not some magical barrier that one day the drug is good to use and the next it is inedible.
Generally you can play it safe by not consuming drugs past their expiration date, but I never heard of anyone dying from eating a drug that went a bit past its expiration date.
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March 21, 2011 at 10:48 am
The vitamins need to go, but the OTC and prescription meds are usually good for a year after the expiration date; that was the advice a pharmacist gave me.
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March 21, 2011 at 11:28 am
For the most part, it just loses it’s effectiveness. If it is a couple of weeks or months past the expiration, then it is usually okay. If it is several months or a couple of years past the expiration, then you shouldn’t take it. At that point the effectiveness is minimal and it might make you sick.
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