Introduction - Uppsala Monitoring Centre

Remedy, the active ingredient was Datura strammonium and it was abused both in
the USA and in the UK (Barnett et al., 1977).
Use: asthma as cigarettes and pipe mixture. Smoking a cigarette made from
about 1 gram of crushed datura relaxes bronchial muscles, calming the
symptoms of asthma. This treatment is still preferred by many elderly French
asthmatics. It was used in Bengal by thieves by combining it with sweetmeats
aiming to stupefy the victim (Leader, 1842).
ADR: It was said to produce aggravation of the dyspnoea, paralytic tremblings,
epilepsy, headache, and apoplexy (Salter, 1859). The poisonous effects were:
headache, agitation, choreic trembling of the arms, dilatation of the pupils,
weakness of sight, dry red tongue, a strong tumultuous pulse, and finally
collapse (Kuborn, 1866). Abuse (Morano, 1972; Bethel, 1978) anticholinergic
syndrome (Shervette et al., 1979). Three teenagers died in France in 1992
(Leader New Scientist, 1992). Datura has been linked to a number of murders
in south-western France where a number of young men were ritually killed in
the early 1990s.
SED 1952: no mention
Withdrawn: in France in 1992 because of abuse and causing the anticholinergic
syndrome (New Scientist (22 August 1992), but ten cases reported the
following year (Roblot et al., 1993).
Availability: Australia (in combination with potassium iodide), France, Brazil,
Germany, Netherlands, Spain and Switzerland (Martindale).
Lifespan: 72 years (as cigarette), c2, 300 year (as a drug)
Delay in recognition: its abuse has always been recognised.
Delay in regulatory action: none following the deaths in France.
Comment: the recognition by the media as a ‘good’ story has frequently been a
spur to action by the regulatory authorities.
429–347 BC Mercury
Mercurous Chloride, Hg 2 Cl 2 , (Calomel, Stedman’s teething powders) first mention
found in 1676.
Use: eye salve, purgative, eczema, psoriasis and syphilis.
ADR: acrodynia (symptoms: pink-coloured rash, irritability, photophobia, painful
and swollen extremities, hyperkeratosis, and hypersecretion of sweat glands
[Aw & Vale, 1996]). It was first recognised by Selter in 1903 (Selter,1904)
and confirmed in 1949 (Launay et al., 1949), but it was probably a series of
28 case published in 1951(Warkany et al., 1951) that initiated the regulatory
action. Warkany also said in 1949 that almost all the individual
manifestations in the form of acrodynia had been known long ago as
manifestations of mercurialism (Warkany, 1951)
SED 1952: There are signs which may serve as evidence that Feer’s