Why doesn't Canadian Excedrin contain aspirin?

April 26, 2009 12:00 PM

Why doesn't Excedrin in Canada contain aspirin?

The Excedrin (or generic equivalent) that I buy in the US has 250mg acetaminophen, 250mg aspirin, and 65mg caffeine. The one in Canada has 500mg acetaminophen and 65mg caffeine. Google yields pages mentioning that Excedrin sold in Canada contains no aspirin. Why?

posted by pravit to Health & Fitness (7 answers total)

IANAD, and this is just a guess, but it could be because they both do pretty much the same thing. The big differences being that acetaminophen (Tylenol) is non-irritating and safe for children and gastric conditions (ulcers, etc), and aspirin is an anti-inflammatory. Cutting the aspirin would make it safer for more people and only remove the anti-inflammatory quality which is likely not a huge deal for most.
posted by ChazB at 1:04 PM on April 26, 2009

Best answer: Its against the law:

C.09.010. No manufacturer or importer shall, after June 30, 1986, sell a drug for analgesia that contains a combination of

(a) a salt or derivative of salicylic acid with another salt or derivative of salicylic acid or with salicylamide; or

(b) acetaminophen with a salt or derivative of salicylic acid or with salicylamide.
posted by squeak at 1:15 PM on April 26, 2009 [1 favorite]

Mod note: Bunch of comments removed. Question is about aspirin, not caffeine.
posted by cortex (staff) at 1:47 PM on April 26, 2009

Response by poster: Squeak nails it. I'm curious to know why Canada has such a law, though.
posted by pravit at 2:28 PM on April 26, 2009

Hmmm... particularly because I recently read (yeah, ok, no cite) that aspirin somewhat blocks the liver harm of the acetaminophen.
posted by Drasher at 2:42 PM on April 26, 2009

A European colleague once told me that it wasn't available in (at least parts of) Europe, either. So, it's not just Canadian law.
posted by Houstonian at 4:07 PM on April 26, 2009

Best answer: Laws against selling mixed analgesics are probably a consequence of phenacetin-containing mixtures causing analgesic nephropathy, which used to cause a small but significant number of cases of chronic renal failure in heavy OTC painkiller consumers. After this connection was recognized, these products were taken off the OTC market, but some countries, like Canada, went farther and blanket banned this kind of mixture.
posted by monocyte at 5:57 PM on April 26, 2009