Found in almost every single over-the-counter cold, sinus and allergy medication, oral phenylephrine, is pretty close to being banned by the FDA here in America.

Oral phenylephrine is an ingredient in popular brands of cold medicine like NyQuil, Sudafed, Benadryl and Mucinex. The reason that the FDA wants to ban the drug is that it doesn’t do anything to help relieve nasal congestion.

The head cheese in charge of all the doctors, Dr. Patrizia Cavazzoni, who is the director of the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research says, “we are taking this next step in the process to propose removing oral phenylephrine because it is not effective as a nasal decongestant.”

This has sort of been in the final stages of a ban for over a year now and is in the final stages before the actual ban sets in. Once the ban goes through, there will be hundreds of brands of cold and sinus medication that will have to be instantly ripped off of store shelves across America.

Here is where it will get dicey: This ban, once instated, will force the makers of all the medications that contain the drug to reformulate their recipe, and will also cause drug stores like Walgreens and CVS to lose a lot of money.

Retail stores sold 242 million bottles of drugs containing phenylephrine in 2022, which generated nearly $1.8 billion in sales, according to a presentation by FDA staff last year.

Interestingly enough, the attempt of a ban of oral phenylephrine by the FDA has been ongoing since 2007, but now seems like it will finally come to a head, as it is in its final stages.

If you’re an old-school NyQuil person, better stock up, as the old formula might soon be a thing of the past.