Secret remedies : $b What they cost and what they containBritish Medical Association
Science
Secret remedies : $b What they cost and what they contain
British Medical Association
Patent medicines
Sodium bicarbonate 1·87 grains.
” chloride 1·81 ”
Borax, partly dehydrated 2·20 ”
Phenol (carbolic acid) trace.
Gum 0·12 grain.
in one tablet. The amount of borax was equivalent to
2·58 grains of the fully hydrated salt.
The estimated cost of the ingredients for 17 tablets is one-twentieth
of a penny.
Besides the “Catarrh Cure” referred to in the above as intended for use
with the tablets, there is a “Special Catarrh Cure” which costs 4s. a
package containing 460 pilules.
On the package it is stated that:
It cures the most aggravated cases of hawking and
spitting of mucus, stuffy or oppressed feeling in
the head, dryness or scabs in the nose, gloomy, dull
spirits, difficulty of breathing, dropping of mucus
from the head into the throat, and liability to take
cold easily.
The directions are:
Take four pellets every hour. Half quantity for children.
The average weight of the pilules was ½ grain. On first opening the
bottle containing them a slight smell of alcohol was noticeable, but
the loss of weight on drying was only 0·08 per cent. No medicament of
any kind could be detected, nor any substance but sugar; determination
of the amount of the latter showed 100 per cent. to be present.
From the odour of alcohol observed it is not unlikely that the pilules
had been “medicated” by treatment with some dilute tincture, but if so,
the amount of medicament so imparted was infinitesimal.
The estimated cost of 460 pilules is one-tenth of a penny.
BIRLEY’S ANTI-CATARRH.
The price charged for this fluid, sold by a London Company, is 1s. 1½d.
a bottle, containing nearly 3 fluid ounces.
The bottle was accompanied by four pages of printed matter headed “The
Birley Monthly Report,” in which the “Anti-Catarrh” was included in
a “List and Prices of Dr. Birley’s Compounds of Free (or Unoxidised)
Phosphorus,” and described as “Special Remedy for Catarrh and
Influenza.” The following extracts are from the same circular, under
the heading “The Wonders of Phosphorus.”
Free (or unoxidised) Phosphorus, whose chief seat or
situation is in the brain, is one of the most important
elements contained in our bodies. Without Free
Phosphorus there can be no thought, and very probably
no life....
One thing is proved beyond doubt, that the degree of
intellectual thought depends upon the amount of Free
Phosphorus in the brain, and just as the Phosphorus is
unduly wasted, so does the brain power weaken....
Free Phosphorus, it is thus shown, must be the saving
agent—no other means is possible. This one element
must be replaced.
The directions are:
For an ordinary cold take one teaspoonful every two
hours until better, then every third and fourth hour,
and finally night and morning.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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