The New York Times June 26, 1913, Page 8
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POISONOUS TABLETS
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Should Be Marked and colored, and issued only on prescription.
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To the Editor of The New York Times:
I presume the recent case of poisoning by taking mercuric bichloride tablets instead of
some kind of tablets for internal use can only be accounted for by the fact of the
poisonous tablets being of the same color or probably the same size as some other harmless
ones, which the unfortunate person happened to have kept on the same shelf with other
medicines used in the house. This is a practice common with the public, who knows
practically little of poisons, the very reason one might think for taking extra care how
they store and handle them.
Bichloride of mercury tablets are manufactured in blue color as well as white, the
natural color of the well-known antiseptic, and it would probably be a good idea if the
law forbade the sale of the latter variety, and made it compulsory for each blue tablet to
be stamped "poison." Also, bichloride of mercury tablets should only be obtained
on prescription from a doctor, thus preventing the sale of the antiseptic in original
bottles.
EDWARD SWALLOW,
New York, June 25, 1913.
