5<5o 
Progress  in  Pharmacy. 
(  Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
\  December,  1913. 
supplement  to  Public  Health  Bulletin  No.  56 :  "  Digest  of  Laws  and 
Regulations  in  force  in  the  United  States  relating  to  the  possession, 
use,  sale  and  manufacture  of  Poisons  and  Habit-forming  Drugs," 
has  recently  appeared  in  Public  Health  Reports  (1913,  v.  28,  pp. 
2111-2147,  2181-2218).  This  supplement  includes  74  pages  of 
closely  printed  material  and  contains  only  references  to  and  abstracts 
of  laws  enacted  during  the  year  19 13.  The  number  and  the  nature 
of  these  laws  appears  to  evidence  a  growing  discontent  with  existing 
conditions  and  undoubtedly  presage  a  more  active  enforcement  ot 
laws  relating  to  poisons  and  Habit-forming  Drugs. 
Bichloride  Legislation. — An  article  in  Public  Health  Reports  for 
November  14,  1913,  (v.  28,  p.  2399)  comments  on  the  present  day 
agitation  for  legislation  bearing  on  the  sale  of  corrosive  mercuric 
chloride  and  points  out  that  the  most  evident  abuse  in  connection 
with  tablets  of  corrosive  sublimate  is  the  present  day  practice  of  mar- 
keting them  under  a  misleading  title  that  gives  no  indication  of 
their  toxic  character.  The  article  also  presents  compilations  of  the 
number  of  suicides  and  of  accidental  deaths  reported  to<  the  Registrar- 
General  of  England  and  Wales  during  the  year  1912  which  tend  to 
show  that  the  recognition  accorded  to  a  poison  by  its  inclusion  in  the 
official  schedule  of  poisons  has  little  or  no  effect  on  the  number  of 
accidental  poisonings  due  to  its  ingestion  while  the  number  of 
suicides  from  the  use  of  scheduled  poisons  is  markedly  greater  than 
from  the  use  of -non-scheduled  poisons,  or  the  corresponding  deaths 
from  accidental  poisoning.  This  is  but  a  reiteration  of  the  frequently 
recorded  observation  that  official  recognition  of  a  substance  as  a 
poison  has  suggestive  influences  and  that  the  morbidly  inclined  are 
much  more  likely  to  use  a  substance  recognized  as  having  toxic 
properties  rather  than  one  regarding  the  toxicity  of  which  they  are 
in  doubt. 
Federal  Legislation. — Among  the  recently  introduced  bills  of 
interest  to  pharmacists  not  the  least  important  are  several  that  are 
designed  to  restrict  interstate  traffic  in  poisonous  substances.  The 
first  of  these,  known  as  S.  3392,  was  introduced  in  the  Senate  by  Mr. 
Ashurst,  of  Arizona,  and  is  designed  to  regulate  the  importation, 
exportation  or  carriage  in  interstate  commerce  of  bichloride  of  mer- 
cury. If- enacted  into  law  it  would  be  a  misdemeanor  to  transport 
in  interstate  commerce  "  any  substance  or  poisonous  compound 
known  as  bichloride  of  mercury  unless  said  substance  or  compound 
be  in  the  form  of  cubes  and  colored  green  so  as  to  be  readily  distin- 
