“I can’t find Children’s Advil or Tylenol anywhere,” he told CTVNews.ca in a phone interview Wednesday. “And knowing that flu season is right around the corner … my anxiety is through the roof.” Since June, Goddard has been struggling to find pain and fever medicine for her children in Mississauga, Ont., where she lives. While her five-year-old son and two daughters, aged three and one, do not have a fever, Goddard said she wishes she had medicine on hand. “I hate feeling helpless,” she said. Goddard is one of several Canadians who wrote to CTVNews.ca about the difficulty of finding pain and fever medicine for their children. Finding it difficult to locate the drug, many parents go to great lengths to ensure that they can. Goddard is among those asking friends and family to help out by hitting stores and buying whatever they can find. Others said they have visited compounding pharmacies for acetaminophen made by lab technicians but had to pay more for the drug. Some families have resorted to buying medicine outside of Canada. CTVNews.ca asked Canadians to share how drug shortages are affecting their families. Emailed responses have not all been independently verified. The Ontario Pharmacists Association sounded the alarm about cold and flu drug shortages across Canada in July. High demand and supply chain issues are blamed for affecting the availability of pain and fever medicines for infants and children, such as liquid children’s Tylenol. The shortages also prompted the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto to issue a letter to patients and caregivers informing them of potential challenges in accessing liquid acetaminophen and ibuprofen. Tylenol is the brand name for acetaminophen, and ibuprofen is marketed under the brand names Advil and Motrin. In August, a social media post shared by Health Canada urged Canadians to avoid buying more acetaminophen and ibuprofen medications than needed for infants and children. Health Canada is also advising patients to consult with doctors and pharmacists about other options in the event of drug shortages and to check the Drug Shortages Canada website for shortages reported by manufacturers. The Health Canada website reported shortages of acetaminophen chewable tablets and Tempra Infant drops, as well as other children’s medications. Shortages occur when a drug manufacturer is unable to meet the demand for a particular drug. To help his 16-month-old daughter get through her COVID-19 symptoms, which included a cough and runny nose, Branden Johnston used smaller doses of medicine meant for older children. His wife is a pediatric nurse who was able to calculate the right dose for their daughter, he said. But for parents without that knowledge or previous experience, trying to do that calculation at home can be dangerous, she said. Despite checking several stores and pharmacies in Grande Prairie, Alta., including Shoppers Drug Mart and Walmart, Johnston said he was unable to find medication for his toddler. “It’s been incredibly difficult to find anything over the counter,” he wrote in an email to CTVNews.ca on Tuesday. “The pharmacies would tell us because there is no retail size available [we] she will have to see a doctor to get them a prescription to repack the larger one [adult or children’s] sizes in a dose suitable for the little one.” Johnston said he was finally able to find a bottle of children’s Advil chewable tablets at Costco. He and his wife crushed the tablets and mixed some with water to give to their daughter using a syringe. “It’s not the best choice, but … you do what you have to do when you’re a parent with a sick child,” Johnston said Wednesday in a phone interview with CTVNews.ca. “Even toilet paper wasn’t that hard to come by.”
COMPOUND PHARMACIES RESOURCE FOR PARENTS
Ellen Patterson works at a compounding pharmacy in Lindsay, Ont., where she and other pharmacists make acetaminophen as a concentrated liquid for parents to buy. The pain and fever medicine is packaged in different sizes and comes with a dosage guide based on the size of the child. Although a prescription is not required, the drug is offered over the counter, meaning it is dispensed by a pharmacist rather than sold over the counter, Patterson said. In recent weeks, more parents than usual have been visiting the pharmacy looking for pain medication for their children, he said. “We are a tiny shop in a small town [and] we see people who are not our normal clientele,” Patterson told CTVNews.ca in a phone interview Wednesday. In an email to CTVNews.ca Thursday, a spokesperson for Haleon, the maker of Advil, wrote that both the COVID-19 pandemic and an “unprecedented” cold and flu season have contributed to a “significant increase in viral illnesses” in Canada. . As a result, the company has seen increased demand for pediatric pain relief products, including Children’s Advil. “This significant increase in demand has resulted in unexpected intermittent disruption at the pharmacy and retail level,” the company said in its email to CTVNews.ca. “We encourage consumers to buy only what they need so that all parents and caregivers have access to the product they need to care for their loved ones.” Johnson & Johnson Inc., the maker of Tylenol, also told CTVNews.ca it is seeing higher-than-normal demand for some of its products when asked to confirm shortages among Tylenol infant and children’s drugs. “We continue to experience increased consumer-driven demand with certain products and markets,” the company said in an email to CTVNews.ca on Thursday. “We are taking all possible measures to ensure product availability.” As some pharmacies struggle with a lack of commercially available children’s medications, Patterson said products offered by pharmacies can serve as another option for parents. In some pharmacies, however, the drug is not provided without additional cost. Lindsay Haggarty said she had been struggling to find liquid children’s Tylenol for her son for months. After visiting a compounding pharmacy near her home in Calgary, she said she paid $27 for a 100 milliliter bottle. By comparison, stores like Walmart sell 100-milliliter bottles of liquid Children’s Tylenol for about $10. “Unfortunately my child is allergic to ibuprofen, so Tylenol is a must for us,” Haggarty wrote in an email to CTVNews.ca on Tuesday. “It’s very disturbing that we can’t get children’s Tylenol.” Other parents, like Alina Smirnova, had to rely on medicine sent from outside the country to make ends meet. Her nine-month-old son was recently diagnosed with roseola, a childhood illness that caused his fever to reach nearly 39 degrees Celsius. Given her son’s negative reaction to liquid Tylenol, Smirnova had to give him suppositories, she said. But despite visiting several pharmacies near her home in Montreal, she was unable to find any medicine for her infant. After sharing her frustration with her parents, who are on vacation in Italy, Smirnova said they were able to buy two packs of suppositories and ship them to Canada for her son. “We went to probably five to six pharmacies around where we live and nothing was available,” he told CTVNews.ca on Wednesday in a phone interview. “I don’t think it is until you have kids [that] you understand how bad the situation is.” Now, Smirnova’s parents are asking if she wants them to buy more medicine before they return. He plans to give them a list of everything he needs, he said. “For me, it was like a 911 situation … I understand why people stock up,” he said. “I don’t wish this on other parents.” Finally, some parents deal with the shortage by simply persevering, calling and visiting as many pharmacies as they can. After calling seven different pharmacies on Saanich Peninsula, British Columbia, on Tuesday, Liz George had no luck finding Infant or Children’s Tylenol for her 11-month-old and nine-year-old children, who are both sick, she said. However, he learned of two pharmacies with another brand of acetaminophen in stock for infants. After hanging up, he drove quickly to the pharmacy and grabbed the last bottle in stock, he said. “The person at the counter said she was surprised there was anything!” George wrote in an email to CTVNews.ca on Tuesday. “I’m thankful I found something.” With files from CTVNews.ca’s Solarina Ho
