POISONING BY MISTAKE.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXX, Issue 4305, 7 January 1875, Page 2

POISONING BY MISTAKE.

TO TIIE EDITOR. Sir, —If the coroner's charge to a jury at Masterton last week is that of a man who knew what he was saying, it is truly alarming to enter any druggist's shop to purchase any medicine. For my own part I never before realised the danger of trusting my life to the caution of a druggist until I read Dr. Spratt'a charge, as reported in Saturday's Standard.: and as such weighty words ought to find their way to every part of the colony, I desire to call your special attention to the following extracts from .that report:— "The coroner then addressed the jury, and drew attention to the fact that no poisons were in the house, or ever had been. The child, though ailing, was not worse on the day the medicine was administered. The symptoms before death, and the post-mortem , appearances were ■ entirely those of poisoning by strychnine. Mr. Skeet (the druggist) acknowledged that he might have taken down the bottle in mistake. Cases of this kind occasionaly happened, and con- --Oft* sidering the large number of poisona in a druggist's shop it was perhaps surprising that they were not more frequent. ... . Considering all the facts of the case he was himself of opinion that thero was no great culpability shown, except the mere error of hastily taking down one drug for another." Surely there ought to be some regulation requiring druggists to keep their poisons on a different shelf from ordinary drugs, and also in different shaped and different colored bottles or jars, when druggists are so liable to make the mistake of "hastily taking down one drug for another ;" and it is hoped that the Legislature will attend to it next session, to protect the public from the risk of such a slight mistake as hastily taking down strychnine in place of some other medicine of a similar color.—l am, &c, Caution. [The law is explicit on the point raised by our correspondent. Section 12 of the' Sale of Poisons Act, IS7I, is as follows:—"It shall be unlawful to sell any poison unless the bottle, vessel, wrapper, or cover in which such poison is contained be distinctly labelled with the name of the article and the word ' Poison,' and with the name and address of the seller of the poison. • And it shall be unlawful to sell any poison of those which are specified in the first part of the first schedule to this Act, or may hereafter be declared to be poisons within the meaning of this Act by Order in Council under the 3rd section of this Act, to any person unknown to the seller, unless introduced by some person known to the seller, and on every sale of any such article the seller shall, before delivery, make or cause to be made, an entry in a book to be kept for that purpose, stating in the form set forth in the third schedule to this Act, the date of.the sale, and the name and address of the purchaser, the name and quantity of the article sold, and the purpose for which it is stated by the purchaser to be required, to which entry the signature of the purchaser and of the person, if any, who introduced him, shall be affixed. And any person selling poison otherwise than is herein provided shall, upon a summary conviction before two Justices of the Peace, be liableto a penalty not exceeding £5 for the first offence; and to a penalty not exceeding £lO for the second or any subsequent offence. And for the purposes of this section, the person on whose behalf any sale is made by any apprentice or servant shall be" deemed to be the seller; but the provisions of this section which are solely applicable to poisons in tho first part of the first schedule to this Act, or which require that the label shall contain the name and address of the seller, Bhall not apply to articles to be exported from New Zealand by wholesale dealers, nor to sales by wholesale to retail dealers in the ordinary course of wholesale dealing, nor shall any of the provisions of this section apply to any medicine supplied by a legallyqualified medical practitioner to his patient, nor apply to an> article when forming part of the ingredients of any medicine dispensed by a person registered under this Act, provided such medicine be labelled in. the manner aforesaid, with the name and address of the seller, and" the ingredients thereof be entered, with ' the name of the person to whom it is sold or delivered, in a book to be kept by the seller for that purpose nor to the sale of arsenic by wholesale dealers in quau tities not less than one hundredweight." The A further provides for the registration of all vendors of poison, in other words all apothecaries and druggists, and makes -it compulsory on them to produce the poisons' sale book to any police officer under-a penalty. Mr. Coroner Spratt must certainly be acquainted with the very stringent provisions of this Act. Of course, we offer no opinion upon the merit of the case in question. That is at present not strictly within our province, but we should say that the Legislature clearly contemplated the prevention of fatal mistakes like the one in question.—Ed. N.Z.T.]