Quack Medicines.

Maoriland Worker, Volume I, Issue 1, 15 September 1910, Page 5

Quack Medicines.

Frauds, Quacks and Dupes.

Rather more than three years ago Mr Hornsby, then member for Wairarapa, introduced his Quackery Prevention Bill, and when this was referred to the committee some extremely valuable evidence was given by Dr J. M. Mason, then Chief Health Officer of New Zealand. In the course of an article contributed to the " New Zealand Times " Dr Mason said :— ELECTRIC BELTS. I have spoken of the electric belt swindles- Great are its varieties—if one may judge from the diversity of names. Only one thing have they in common, that is an absolute absence of anything in the shape of electricity iai any of the ordinary meanings of the word. The fraud which is said to be the invention of M'Laughlin has a beautiful, useless little arrangement at one end, fastened so as to suggest a il coupler up." We have all heard of the proverb, " Honour amongst thieves.," but it would seem—if we are to rely upon the same veracious data, the advertisement pages of the monthly magazine—that these exploiters of so-called electric remedies have fallen away even from this guiding principle of rascaldom. We have the alleged discoveries of the Drycell belt imploring the readers not to waste money on such out-of-date articles as the M'Laughlin. More thunderbolts—if one is to judge by the pictures—are thrown off from the Drycell belt than from the more venerable fraud; and here let mc describe briefly what these belts are really made of. A series of small pieces of zinc and copper are covered over by stout jean, the total cost being probably something under five shillings. The man who has been foolish enough to invest his £B—that is the price of the cheapest quality—is advised, to soak the belt in vinegar and wear it next his skin. The result of locking in the fumes of the vinegar, combined with the acid in the wearer's perspiration, is to produce an irritation and redness. The irritation naturally occupies a considerable amount of the patient's attention, and for the time he forgets his " fulness after meals," and has little time to devote to the study of the specks which float before his eyes when he stoops. THE ALCOHOL CURSE. With reference to this much vaunted remedy, it was shown in evidence that PER UNA CONTAINED 42 PER CENT OF PROOF SPIRIT. It ivas sold by grocers and others who were in the habit of selling other patent medicines. The price was 4s 10d per bottle, and it set out on the label that it was recommended that it be given to children at the rate of a teaspoonful before each meal. The Brisbane " Telegraph." commenting on this last, said : " The State is put to tremendous expense to , counteract the effects of the drink habit. Police gaols, courts., lunatic asylums, poorhouses, largely are the outcome of the evil. It is bad enough when individuals knowingly place themselves within the grip of the drink monster, but how much worse it is when individuals who are unaware of their danger are insidiously led into the habit by preparations such as that before the Court this morning? What possible hope have temperance societies of effecting their excellent purpose when such preparations are to be obtained, and are consumed for medicinal purposes?" BILE BEANS. Hear what Lord Ardwell said in July. 1905, in the Court of Session, Edinburgh, about Bile Beans:—"lt is founded entirely upon fraud, impudence and advertisement," and that brings mc to the part which the members of the fourth estate—the newspapers —play in this system of fraud and deceit. After showing at great length the " paid aid " given by newspapers to the profitmongers, Dr Mason goes on to refer to CONSUMPTION CURES. Take the much vaunted " Sacco." You cannot pick up a paper but what you see its extravagant claims proclaimed. Consumption is the least of the ailments which it assures you it can cure. I am not in. any way overstating it when I say that it is not of the slightest use in this disease. 1 know of my own knowledge that many have tried this stuff, and not one has received the slightest benefit. With an ingenuousness that few patent medicine vendors have, the local agent asked mc to try the stuff upon some of

the patients at the consumption sanatorium at Cambridge. Before doing so I asked lor an assurance that it contained nothing that could do any harm. Does the agent tell you the result of these experiments? Not much! The stuff, after a very careful trial, proved quite useless, and yet he continues to proclaim in the newspapers that it is an absolute, cure. " If the medicine does you no good, ask for your money back," so runs the advertisement. But if I were a consumptive, after I had' taken " Shiloth," '" Sacco, or any of the vaunted cures, I should be less interested in recovering my money than in getting back my wasted chance of life." WHAT PATENT MEDICINES CONTAIN. In his evidence before the Quackery Prevention Bill Committee, Dr Mason gave certified analyses of some scores of patent medicines, with approximate cost. The following are selected as typical :— Clarke's Blood Mixture contains potassiumiodide, sal volatile, chloroform, syrup, burnt syrup and ■water. Cost, 1 l-3d per bottle. Sale price, 2s 9d. Burgess's Lion Ointment contains lead plaster, beeswax, resin, olive oil, -water and lard. Cost, lOd per lb. Sale price, Is lid per oz. Obesity Cures: — (1) Trilene Tablets contain fucus vesiculosus in pulp, starch, sugar, water, yellow dye. Cost l-40d. Sale price, 2s 6d per packet. (2) Allan's Anti-Fat contains potassium-iodide, salicylic acid, glycerine, extract of fucus vesiculosus, water. Cost, 3d. Sale price, 6s 6d per bottle. Warner's Safe Cure contains potassiumnitrate, oil of gaultheria, rectified , spirit, glycerine, water. (This medicine contains 10 per cent pure alcohol.) Cost, 5Jd. Sale price, 2s 9d per bottle. Doan's Backache Kidney Pills contain juniper, hemlock-pitch, potassium-nitrate, fenugreek, wheat-flour, maize-starch. Cost price, Jd. Sale price, 2& 9d per bottle. Hughes's Blood Pills contain merely aloes, resin, powdered cinchona-bark, ginger and oil of cloves, and yet the advertisements say they remove the conditions causing Blest, Scurvy, Piles, Boils, King's Evil, Swollen Glands, Inflammation of the Eyes and Lids, Pains in the Sides, Back and Kidneys, Cough, Bronchitis, Pleurisy, Rheumatism, Wounds in the Legs and different parts of the body, Cancer, Pimples, Eruptions, Chilliness Headaches, Indigestion, Dyspepsia, Vomiting, Consumption, Toothache, Fits, St Vitus' Dance, Liver Complaints, Yellow Jaundice, Depression , , Stitch, Fever, Plague, Gout, Nerve Diseases, Lumbago, etc., etc. Dr "Williams's Pink Pills contain sulphate of iron, carbonate of potash, liquorice, sugar, starch and colouring matter. Beecham's Pills contain aloes, ginger and Boap. Holloway's Pills contain aloes, rhubarb, saffron, sulphate of soda and capsicum, ■and so on with various other " popular pills," compounded for the most part of aloes and soap, and if articles , can be sold for several shillings which cost only a few pence, it is no wonder that patent medicine proprietors are able to publish advertisements in every newspaper in the world—a good fhing for the newspapers, but a bad thing for the people. Soothing Syrups, as everybody knows, contain comparatively large quantities of opium, morphia, etc., whereby innocent little babies are " drugged" in a rest as unreal as it is unwholesome. MEDICAL INSTITUTIONS. In conclusion, a reference may be made to the suit for damages of Mr Robert Grimson against the Freeman and Wallace Institute in Sydney in 1908. This man, met with an accident as a boundary rider, and h© underwent treatment for rupture from October to February at the institute, and was subsequently cured in a private hospital within one ■week by a simple operation for varicose veins. He was not ruptured at all. In his summing-up Mr Justice Cohen remarked , :—"For cruel cunning, unmeasured audacity and hypocritical pretence I doubt whether the annals of the Courts of this State disclose a case to which the application of those epithets could be more justly applied. It is a strong illustration of man's inhumanity to man. It shows how the craft and cunning of designing men in their haste and hunger for money can set at nought the feelings and sufferings of their fellow-men, no what sacrifice may be involved m their "machinations." . '. . Tfee whole atmosphere of the institution reeks with wickedness." A verdict of £450 damages was given, with a rider urging that legislative and other measures be taken to suppress all such pernicious institutions as the one in question. NEWSPAPER RESPONSIBILITY. All these nostrums and institutions are being advertised in the daily Press of this dominion, which thus becomes a party to the exploitation, of the people by articles and methods which it knows to be fraudulent, and yet we are asked to believe that the newspaper Press can be trusted to guide and protect the people!