CORONER VOICES CONCERN OVER DANGER OF DRUGS

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXVI, Issue 23093, 4 November 1949, Page 6

CORONER VOICES CONCERN OVER DANGER OF DRUGS

“The increasing number of deaths from overdoses of drugs, to say nothing of the more numerous cases where fatal results have not eventuated, must give wide concern, said the coroner, Mr. A. Addison, at an inquest iu Auckland on Wednesday.

"The drugs themselves are rather too easily obtainable and the normal prescription is, I understand, for a quantity which, if taken contrary to instructions, would constitute a fatal overdose," continued Mr. Addison. “Apart from those persons who deliberately take an overdose with the intention of committing suicide, there are two well-recognised dangers arising from the use of these drugs: the automatic repetition of dosage by the patient because of confusion of the mind from the initial dose, and. secondly, the cunning and sly methods adopted by the patient to accumulate a supply.

“In the present case it is noted that prescriptions by two different medical practitioners were dispensed within two days in April of this year, said the coroner. “I am aware that the medical profession in general is fully alive to the dangers I have referred to, and I suggest those dangers would be reduced if practitioners exercised extraordinary caution in prescribing, limited any prescription given to a few davs’ supply, and ensured as far as possible that the administering of the drug was not left to patients, but entrusted to persons who were previously informed as to the dangers and warned to guard against them." The coroner leturned a verdict in the case of a widow who died on September 22 at her home that death was due to barbiturate poisoning resulting from a self-administered overdose of sleeping tablets.