Iodine Availability

[tourdeforce]

Hello Folks,

I have just recently been trying to buy a bottle of iodine from various high street pharmacies. This has proved impossible and I cannot even get a prescription for it. I have been told that it is law that it cannot be purchased in its neat form.

However ....
I could simply go onto ebay and buy from the many sellers selling it on there. The reason I am reluctant to do that is although most seem to be claim it is one brand (Lugol's), they all seem to have non professional home produced labels on the bottles.

I am confused. Is it illegal to sell?
What are they selling on ebay and why are they allowed to sell it if it is supposed to be illegal?

Any help would be appreciated.


Looking forward to your answer in anticipation.
Best regards,
Mr DeForce

[Mamyalynne]

I should imagine any Pharmacist would quote the law preventing sale to you if they were asked.

[Bathsheba]

He may want to dilute it.......

[Jackdaw33]

Never mind iodine. Just try going into a chemist's to buy cheap, old-fashioned remedies like liquid paraffin or kaolin and morphine, to name but two. They look at you as if you had just crawled off the ark!

[Bathsheba]

Jackdaw,....selling Morphine these days? I can understand why that's been stopped ;) x x

[Cloverjo]

I'm sure you can still get kaolin and morphine, but what would you do with liquid paraffin?

[Jackdaw33]

Kaoline and morphine mixture was a cheap remedy for bad guts and diarrhoea. The amount of morphine was infinitesmal. Liquid paraffin was the opposite, used for constipation.

[Cloverjo]

Pregnant women are advised to take iodine tablets now, so will be available. Not sure about liquid form, though. I remember a friend using the liquid version on her feet on holiday about 20 odd years ago, but haven't seen it recently. Perhaps it is now illegal for some reason. Can't imagine why.

[Jackdaw33]

My mother always had a bottle of iodine in the medicine cabinet; it was used for painting wounds when we fell down and grazed our knees.

[Buenchico]

The sale of iodine to purify drinking water has been banned within the EU since 25 October 2009. Since pharmacists can't be certain as to the use which any iodine they sell might be put, that effectively bans the sale of iodine outright.

[Jackdaw33]

Thanks for the clarification. I had a sneaking feeling that the dreaded EU would be at the back of this.

[tourdeforce]

But why is it readily available on ebay?

[hc4361]

A lot of illegal things are available on eBay

[hc4361]

You can also buy it from Amazon
Amazon.co.uk User Recommendation

[mccfluff]

have you tried a non high street pharmacy? I bought a bottle of iodine not that long ago, i can't remember exactly when, but probably around a year or so ago, pretty cheap as well, i think it was 1.99 and that was at the local one down the road not a big outfit like boots or lloyds

[woofgang]

i can legally get kaolin and morphine online from a real uk pharmacy, its branded stuff, called collis browns. Not cheap but it helps with my ibs when nothing else does.

[Calibax]

I believe tincture of iodine can be used in the illicit production of metamphetamine which is one of the reasons it is now banned in the EU.

[gingejbee]

Careful...Lugol's iodine is NOT a brand - it is a solution of iodine and potassium iodide in water named after the bloke (French, I think) who originally made it.
It is not the same as "tincture of iodine" (which is probably what you were wanting) which is just iodine crystals dissolved in alcohol.

[woofgang]

will veterinary povidone iodine do you?
http://www.viovet.co.uk/Vetasept_Povodine_Iodine/c6626/?quick_find=127007&;gclid=CLn6v8D2pccCFafLtAodyI0H1w

[hc4361]

I thought Collis Brown's Mixture is morphine and peppermint oil