356 HOW DOES MAN DETERMINE THE VALUE OF FOOD? 



Act now requires that the label show a statement of the alcohol, 

 acetanilid, cocaine, opium, and certain other harmful drugs con- 

 tained in a patent medicine, many people do not read the label, 

 so the danger continues. What is far worse, the use of such drugs 

 often leads to the drug habit. There is danger also from prussic 

 acid, arsenic, and other deadly drugs not covered by the law. 



Cure-alls. Perhaps the worst thing about patent medicines is 

 that they rarely cure any one, and they take an immense amount 

 of money from people who can ill afford to spend it. Nearly 

 $300,000,000 a year is estimated to be spent for patent medicines 

 alone in this country. Many people, incurably ill with tuberculosis 

 or cancer, make their condition worse through the purchase of cough 

 or cancer cures, which probably contain a habit-forming drug or 

 alcohol. Think how much more good the money thus spent 

 would have done had it been invested in proper foods and good 

 nursing, or in gaining the advice of a reliable physician. 



Due to the fact that the present law does not require the publish- 

 ing of the composition of the medicine on the label, the public 

 is being continually fooled into paying big prices for worthless 

 or even dangerous combinations of drugs. Think of paying $3.00 

 for a few cents' worth of washing soda and salt. Or $.50 for $.01 

 worth of Epsom salt. Yet this is being done every day. To 

 paraphrase a great showman : " There are some people who 

 always want to be fooled." Are any friends of yours in this 

 class ? 



One of the reasons why people buy patent medicines is because 

 they read the glowing testimonials written by people who say 

 they have been cured by patent medicines. Investigation of 

 such letters often shows that they have been written by people 

 who were paid for writing them. There is a regular business in 

 the buying and selling of patent medicine testimonials. Such 

 testimony is worthless, and in cases where the testimonial is written 

 in good faith how do we know that the person who wrote it really 

 did receive the benefits testified to from that particular medicine. 

 Frequently we know he did not because death notices of people 

 who wrote, saying that they have been cured of tuberculosis or 

 kidney trouble by this or that nostrum, have been found in the 



