CHRIS SEGAL
News Editor
I’m looking for the quick fixes just like everyone else of my generation. When an early morning is required, I have been known to take a Tylenol PM to go to sleep early. Sleeping pills are safe in moderation, like most drugs.
Over-the-counter drugs can be just as dangerous as prescribed drugs if taken in the wrong or large doses. Downing an entire bottle of Nyquil is just as dangerous as the date rape drug GHB.
Upon reading the medical book “Why do Men have Nipples?” by Mark Leyner and Billy Goldberg, I learned that taking Tylenol PM could be unhealthy because of the pain relieving qualities of the pills. If your body is in no pain, and you taking the Tylenol to induce sleep, you are also introducing the analgesic Acetaminophen.
I am not the only person who has taken a sleeping pill to induce sleep. About 42 million sleeping pill prescriptions were filled last year up nearly 60 percent since 2000, according to the research company IMS Health.
Ambien is the most popular prescribed sleeping pill, but Lunesta is quickly catching up. Drug manufactures spent $298 million in the first 11 months of 2005 to convince consumers that the sleep aids are safe and effective. That was more than four times such ad spending in all of 2004, according to the New York Times.
Advertisers are aggressively marketing their drugs to consumers and people are popping more sleeping pills. Research shows that more women than men suffer from insomnia. Lunesta’s recent media blitz was tied to the second season of “Desperate Housewives” through heavy commercial advertising.
Sleeping pills are obviously becoming more prominent whether over-the-counter or by prescription.
Pills offer students other quick fixes. Look at the Adderall craze around the nation’s colleges before finals. This time the goal is to stay up and to continue studying. With our days becoming busier, pills to stay awake and study or to induce sleep appear to be good solutions.
In a world of instant noodles, microwavable dinners, campus-wide wireless access to the Internet and papers college students are more likely to try quick fixes to their everyday problem of not having enough time in a day to accomplish everything. Maybe it’s wrong or unhealthy to take Tylenol PM, Ambien or Lunesta to get to sleep early, but millions of Americans will continue to do it because they can see the short-term results.
Before becoming one of the over- the-counter sleeping pill poppers remember that these pills can lead to shot-term amnesia, sleepwalking and death. The next time I fly internationally I’m taking a sleeping pill, but I’ll refrain from the urge to induce sleep after being up the previous from cramming for a midterm.
02-09-2006
