Back in 2019, I used to be recognized with ADHD at age 40, a course of I described for the Guardian. The prognosis got here as a shock to me, however to not anybody I knew: positive, I’d by no means been particularly hyperactive (and even, y’know, energetic), however the power lateness, issue concentrating, lack of emotional self-regulation and decades-long battle to find my keys … these have been all basic signs.
I used to be prescribed a drugs known as Vyvanse, which I’ve been taking day by day since. It’s confirmed immensely useful, permitting me to settle into a fairly regular routine of writing and dealing. The times once I simply can’t get something carried out have been additional and additional separated by intervals of unprecedented productiveness.
In different phrases, all the pieces has been going fairly rattling effectively on the ADHD entrance. Or a minimum of, it had till July this yr, once I moved to the US.
I lived in New York Metropolis for a lot of the 2010s, returning to my native Australia in late 2017 when the corporate for which I used to be working went bust. My American accomplice joined me in Melbourne. We acquired married and utilized for a inexperienced card. Then Covid occurred, and so forth, and so forth, and it wasn’t till July 2023 that we packed our baggage and moved again to New York.
Clearly, I made positive to convey as a lot Vyvanse as doable with me. “As a lot as doable” turned out to be two months’ price, and the primary month of our return was occupied solely with discovering a spot to dwell. As soon as that was sorted, although, my Vyvanse provide had began to wane, and with a two-week journey out of state on the horizon, I started wanting into getting a brand new prescription.
Anybody who’s blessed sufficient to not have skilled the US’s, um, idiosyncratic strategy to healthcare would possibly suppose that this course of ought to have been comparatively easy. In spite of everything, I’m a accountable grownup, I’ve been fortunately taking the remedy in query for 5 years with out points, I’ve a letter from my physician testifying to that truth (together with medical information, and so forth), and I used my newfound freedom to decide on an insurance coverage plan to pick out one which particularly coated ADHD drugs.
If that’s the case, let me gently disabuse you of that notion, as a result of getting Vyvanse within the US in 2023 is a nightmare.
There are two causes for this. The primary is that there’s clearly been a response to the opioid fiasco of the 2010s, an period during which I walked away from a root canal with a no-questions-asked prescription for 60 Vicodin tablets. Sadly, that response hasn’t been something as smart as “let’s reform our outdated, pointlessly punitive drug legal guidelines and throw the Sacklers in jail till the warmth demise of the universe.” No, it’s been extra alongside the traces of “let’s impose ever extra insane restrictions on ‘managed substances’ and deal with anybody attempting to acquire them with suspicion.”
The quantity of harm this has carried out to anybody unlucky sufficient to want prescription opiates to handle ache has been effectively documented, however there’s additionally been an enormous overcorrection in regard to different “managed substances”. At the moment, simply discovering a health care provider who will prescribe ADHD drugs is one thing of an ordeal: most normal practitioners received’t even seek the advice of on ADHD, not to mention prescribe drugs. You may need extra luck with a psychiatrist, besides that my insurance coverage plan requires a referral from a normal practitioner to see a psychiatrist, which might be effective however for the truth that normal practitioners received’t see you about ADHD, so … sigh.
The primary normal practitioner who agreed to truly communicate to me insisted on attempting to diagnose me with ADHD – a situation with which I’ve already been being handled for 5 years, keep in mind – earlier than she’d “even think about” prescribing something. Fortunately, a number of weeks after my search started, I lastly discovered a health care provider who agreed to offer me a prescription as soon as she noticed the letter from my physician in Australia. She even provided to set me up with an revolutionary on-line pharmacy who’d ship the remedy to my door.
Hurrah! Now I simply must fill the script, and – oh pricey Lord. Why does that say “$444.16”?
It’s possible you’ll do not forget that my insurance coverage plan specified explicitly that it covers ADHD drugs. Properly, it seems that “we cowl ADHD drugs” really means “we could the truth is cowl ADHD drugs – however we may additionally select to not, particularly if we reckon we are able to put you on one thing cheaper.” Once more, one would possibly suppose this might be a query for a health care provider, an concept to which the insurance coverage trade’s collective response seems to be “lol”.
OK. Superb. It took a few days to kind prior authorization, and now all I needed to do is get the revolutionary on-line pharmacy to schedule a supply. Wednesday? That’s excellent, as a result of I fly out on Thursday. I’m positive they’ll inform me effectively upfront if there are any issues. I imply, they wouldn’t do something as obnoxious as wait till Wednesday evening to inform me that they’re out of inventory, proper? Proper?
Oh. And this results in the second motive why this course of has been so terrible: there’s a extreme and ongoing scarcity of ADHD drugs within the US, one whose results have prolonged to different nations across the globe. On condition that amphetamines have been first synthesized within the Eighties and the cartels appear to be pumping out huge portions of methamphetamine fortunately sufficient, you would possibly surprise why ADHD meds are so arduous to search out.
The intuitive reply is that as a result of Vyvanse, Adderall and the like are managed substances, the Meals and Drug Administration (FDA) and Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) put quotas on their manufacturing. Nevertheless, whereas it’s arduous to know precisely what’s occurring, the reply doesn’t appear to be so simple as “the feds received’t let drug corporations manufacture sufficient provide.”
A letter issued by the FDA in August 2023 famous that “primarily based on DEA’s inner evaluation of stock, manufacturing, and gross sales information submitted by producers of amphetamine merchandise, producers solely bought roughly 70% of their allotted quota for the yr, and there have been roughly 1 bn extra doses that they might have produced however didn’t make or ship,” and that “information for 2023 to this point present an analogous pattern.”
Anyway, the explanations for the scarcity don’t matter whenever you’re simply attempting to get your remedy. And hoo boy, whether or not or not the managed substance legal guidelines are behind the scarcity, they make the method of attempting to fill a script absurdly, needlessly troublesome. Can I get an precise bodily prescription after which ask round till I discover a pharmacy? Nope. “Sorry, sir, it is a managed substance.” As a substitute, I’ve to name the physician and get them to ship the prescription to a particular pharmacy. However tips on how to know whether or not a given pharmacy has inventory? Can I name round and ask? “I’m sorry, sir, we are able to’t let you know that. It’s a managed substance.” You possibly can’t … go and look within the provide cupboard? “No, sir, it’s a managed substance.“
There’s one thing particularly obnoxious about forcing folks with an government perform dysfunction to barter a system so Byzantine it’d give Franz Kafka conniptions.
As I write this – and by God, has penning this ever been a trial – I’ve been unmedicated for over per week. I’ve bizarre episodes of one thing that’s not in contrast to narcolepsy, the place out of nowhere, I all of a sudden get overwhelmingly sleepy. I’ve intermittent complications – precise bodily ones, along with the plentiful metaphorical ones that come from attempting to take care of this nightmare. And the psychological static to which I referred to in my unique piece is again with a vengeance: focus is slippery and ephemeral, and my consideration wanders like a kitten consistently discovering new issues to play with.
The ultimate irony is that if Vyvanse was any enjoyable, I might in all probability have it illegally delivered to my door in half an hour, like every other illicitly leisure drug for which the US has an urge for food. However the factor is that, as a prodrug, with its amphetamine part tied to an amino acid molecule, Vyvanse solely has bioavailability if swallowed. Identical to all the pieces else about this hellish course of, it’s, the truth is, no enjoyable in any respect.
