A VALUABLE SUGGESTION.

Temuka Leader, Issue 1389, 8 September 1885, Page 3

A VALUABLE SUGGESTION.

In the Inst number of Chambers Journal, a corespondent makes the following suggestion with regard to sale of poisons : —“ Too frequently, it seems to me, death from poisoning occurs for the want of the proper remedy being quickly applied. Those on the spot are ignorant of it, and while excitedly hunting for it in a medical book or waiting for the doctor’s arrival, the chance of saving life is lost, I would suggest that no poison should be retailed without being accompanied by clear indications of the appropriate remedies to be used in case of mishap, and the treatment to be adopted during or prior to administration. These instructions might form an integral part of the label in some cases, and where the bottle was too small could be folded in a small cardboard pill-box sort of appendage, to fit like a cap—or rather like a shoe—on the base of the bottle, and which could he made to fit very tightly, or be gummed on the bottle itself. I bare heard of the effects of certain poison being neutralised by swallowing the mortar scraped from the walls, and others by swallowing white of egg ; but in too many cases the expedients are known nothing about until it is too late.”— the Journal adds : “We agree with our correspondent in deeming it expedient that their antidotes or amelioratiues ought in every case to accompany poisons that are vended to the public, It should be imperative.”