Sugar Free Halls Cough Drop Review

A plague of epic proportions visited my home in the past month.  It left no prisoners in its wake.  All members of my family experienced fever and body aches, which then progressed into a cold.
It was like an influenza strain mated with a cold virus.  Their offspring was then blessed by the dark lord in order to create as much misery from copious amounts of mucus as humanly possible.  As (bad) luck would have it, I have been affected most by this pandemic in our home.
While most of my symptoms have cleared up, there is a nasty cough that has settled in my chest.  It's like a little goblin resides in my esophagus, constantly tickling it with a feather.

Nobody likes a sick person.  At work, church, home, or the strip club, this becomes a major downer.  Nobody hears a co-worker attempting to cough up a small intestine, and thinks, "Oh..I hear Bobby coughing.  Good thing he's at his cubicle.  I have a few questions for him." 
The more likely thought is, "Damn that Bobby and his sickness.  It's like he turns on a spray gun full of virus with every cough.  If he gets me sick, I'm going to break his neck and leave him in the janitors closet---and then take his window cubicle."

I repeat...Nobody likes a sick person, and I didn't want that sick person to be me.  This is one of the reasons I picked up a small pallet of Halls Sugar Free cough drops.  I needed a way to mask my guttural hacking from others.

I don't know how cough drops work, but I sure love em.  I generally opt for the Black Cherry or Honey Lemon flavor, but have been known to delve into the Mountain Menthol flavor as well.
Halls claims that these drops have "triple soothing action."  They'll soothe a sore throat, relieve a cough, and clear nasal passages.  The drops do seem to have some positive effect in all of these areas.

Unfortunately, I have now become addicted to cough drops.  Anytime the tickle goblin pulls out the feather, I throw in another cough drop.  I think I've become a closet chain "dropper."  I hide my wrappers from the kids.  I brush my teeth after eating them to hide the smell.  I desire a drop in the mornings, after meals, and while driving in my car.  I don't think I can quit.
In fact, I've started sucking on drops at night when my cough is acting up.  I'll wake up in the morning with thick, sticky Black cherry drop residue around the edges of my mouth like I was a 4 year old eating a Popsicle.  Cough drop wrappers scattered up to my ankles.

Menthol is one of the active ingredients in the drops.  What does the menthol do?  I don't know.
For those of you that may be worried about the menthol content of these drops, the US national cancer institute has said that you would need to ingest ~3461 drops a day in order for the chemicals to interact negatively with your body.  Luckily, I am only at about 2500 drops a day...thus I think I'm pretty safe.

I think I may have to eventually see a doctor...not for my cough, but to wean me off of cough drops.
I give the Halls sugar-free cough drops a 4-star rating.  I docked them a star as they haven't found a way to implement a bacon flavor into a cough drop yet.  When they do---that will be real addiction.