We can trade them to you all in exchange for mercurochrome (merbromin: http://www.google.com/search?source...4.98zYQ mi8Qtc ), which was stupidly banned here in the U.S. but is available in Canada!

And thanks to over-regulation (que GH), it was banned because the product was "guilty until proven innocent". Due to the high cost of studies to prove it was ok, companies just gave up and quit selling it in the USA.

From Wiki
The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) moved it from the “generally recognized as safe” classification into the “untested” classification.

I read that, too :)

That said, given how our culture has evolved to be so lawsuit paranoid, I cannot blame the corporate decision makers for backing off, especially when they stand to lose money on the deal.
...
Now, imagine doing hard time for smuggling mercurochrome into the US :)

Doug

.

Yep--just the fact that it contains mercury ("Heavy metals are dangerous!") was all it took, despite no evidence of it causing harm when used as directed. (The lead paint and asbestos 'hysteriae' are just as pathetic; yes, they can be harmful, but only if ingested or inhaled. If sealed into their applied-to surfaces, they're perfectly safe, but the regulators act as if they're radioactive, being dangerous just by their presence.) Also:

Having lymphedema, I've found mercurochrome (I'm stretching out my last bottle of it) particularly helpful, but when I asked about it at my Wal-Mart's pharmacy last year, just on the off chance that they might have some (maybe available by prescription), they had no idea what mercurochrome even *was*! I felt like Winston Smith in "Nineteen Eighty-Four," where certain facts--which he remembered--had been erased from all magazines and books (Wikipedia is sort of like Oceania's always-changing past issues of "The Times" in that regard... :-) ).

Well, I know of two space modelers--one British, one German--who smuggled (illegally [hidden in Greek or Roman "column tubes for an architectural model"] and via diplomatic pouch) model rocket motors into their respective countries. Today someone could make a "Smokey and the Bandit" sequel about mercurochrome smuggling... :-) (Even YORF doesn't know the word "mercurochrome," as it keeps putting the red 'error squiggle' line under it wherever it appears in the text.)

We had an old bottle of mercurochrome in the medicine cabinet until just recently (with the skull and crossbones). When I was unable to get it replaced at my local drug stores I found out about the kerfuffle. Millions of people used it for decades with no apparent problems. And what ever happened to green soap? They had it in my elementary schools' dispensary to clean up kids' wounds. And castor oil? Time marches on.

Castor oil is still around, both as a cleaning agent (ha ha) and in glow fuel. However, brushless motor and battery technologies have taken a big bite out of glow engine use. You could say that lithium battery technology is flushing castor oil down the toilet... :p :rolleyes:

You can still get Castor oil by the gallon as Klotz Benol.

Mercurochrome was a lousy antiseptic when introduced.
It still is.
Sooo many better alternatives, so I assume all this banter about this substance is just tongue in cheek.

Allen

More like nostalgia.