95 



fur medicinal purposes. How many would be willing to administer to children 

 compound licorice jniwder prepared with senna leaves containing 25 per cent of sand? 

 Probably n. other drug has caused so much annoyance and dissatisfaction during 

 the past year as a>afetida. When the drug sections of the federal law were put into 

 eiYect ai the various ports it was found that this commodity was brought in containing 

 various amouii's <>i' alcohol-soluble material. No important quantity of exceedingly 

 inferior matt-rial was offered, and for the time being no detentions were made, even 

 though this druu f was somewhat below the strength prescribed by the U.S. P. for 

 alcohol-eoluble matt-rial. It soon developed, however, that importers were bringing 

 in Micce.-sivi' lower irrades of this product, for example, the alcohol-soluble material 

 dimini.-hed gradually from 40 to 30 to 25 and to 20 per cent, and one consignment was 

 offered oiitainin-. according to the declaration on the containers, as low as 15 per 

 cent of this material, while one case of this consignment was found to possess only a 

 tritle over ; per cent of sin-h alcohol-soluble material. The Pharmacopoeia also 

 ribea an ash limit. of 1"> per cent. The virtue of asafoetida resides largely, if not 

 exdu-ively, in the al ohol-oluhle material, and it would therefore seem that the 

 a.-h limit should be liberal. If an importation were offered containing on the average 

 ii'o-iiila al< -ohol-soluble material, but the ash was materially 



ali.\e the limit pn-< ribed by the Pharmacopoeia, such an importation should not be 

 considered illegal. 



Attention i- al.-o dm-< -ted to another drui:. namely, copaiba. During the past year 



<|iianiiiies of this produ< -t \\ere imported and correspondingly large examinations 



wen- made ai the porti parn< ularly New York. It will be recalled that the test as 



originally pre.-cribed by the commit! f revision of the I ".S. P. was modified at the 



liciiaiion of man\ dealers in this commodity. The result is that the new 



meih -.reliable ami unsatisfactory as to permit the entry of copaiba containing 



at le.i-i 25 per ci-nt "Hiurjun bal-am, the common agent used for its adulteration. A 



:on ari-in- it- oinie. t h ,11 with this commodity is, Shall the definition given 



relati\e to ei.paiba as contained in the I'. S.I', be strictly adhered to, or shall we 



inder the name copaiba. qualified or otherwise, any other commodity which 



i\e,| from other -nin-m than tho>e definitely prescribed by the above authority? 



;.le, then- i- c on-tantly oiirn-.l for importation a product known as African 



Copaiba, which i- derived from an entirely different geographical source than the 



comm..,|! ,-d by the Pharmacopu-ia. It is well known that the African 



oleoresin duiers materially in coin|M.siiini and therapeutic action from the copaiba 



; by the IS. P. African copaiba certainly is not copaiba within the mean- 



ihe pharmacopu-ial detinition for this commodity. 



Another problem requiring attention is the dilution of certain drugs with inert 

 iie 1'harmacopo'ia prescribes a lower limitof alkaloidal content forcer- 

 tain INIII-IH druu'- :m.i ii ha.- developed that millers are adding to alkaloidal drugs 

 assaying above the 1.. \\i-r limii pn > ribed by the Pharmacopoeia such inert material as 

 ;. Te.l oli\e .-lone- -o a.- ! reduce th,> alkaloidal content to the lowest limit pre- 

 d by the abo\e auihorii\ . There is nothing in the Pharmacopoeia that would 

 indicate that such a practice wa> contemplated or recognized. The committee 

 undoubtedly WM familiar with the fact that alkaloidal drugs frequently contain a 

 amount of alkaloidal material than the lower limit prescribed, but only in one 

 and that i> opium, is there a specilic provision made for the addition of a foreign 

 inert matt-rial so as to reduce the product to a strength conforming to both a lower and 

 an upper limit. This is an imjx>rtani question and requires adjustment in the near 

 future. 



Attention has al>o been directed to the fact that there are many commodities on the 

 market which probably owe their virtues to their alcoholic content; for example, 

 then- an- a number of so-called (for want of better names) medicinal wines, bitters, 

 etc., which contain only a dash of some medicinal substance such as extract of cm- 



