Household Poisons Risk Fought

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30762, 28 May 1965, Page 11

Household Poisons Risk Fought

(N.Z. Press Association—Copyright)

SYDNEY, May 27.

The Australian Health Department is to combat the increasing risk of children being poisoned by household products by setting up a “poison clinic” at the Royal Alexander Hospital for Children in the Sydney suburb of Camperdown.

Hospital staff will ask manufacturers of medical and household goods dangerous to children to supply details of all poisonous substances in their products. The information will be filed at the clinic so it will be readily on hand in an emergency.

The clinic will then be able to advise a doctor or parent over the telephone what poisons a substance contains and what antidote can be

given for on-the-spot treatment.

This emergency treatment could keep a child alive until more thorough medical aid is available. A doctor at the Royal Alexander Hospital said 200 children were treated there for poisoning in 1962 and 159 in 1963. Of these, four died in 1962 and one died in 1963.

If the clinic proves successful, it will be used as a pilot model for others in all Australian cities and large towns.