A comprehensive account of an American drug calamity.
A neurologist details the plight of a dangerous antibiotic potion in this medical history.
Martin spent 10 years researching the saga of a little-known concoction called Elixir Sulfanilamide. Prescribed for ailments such as strep throat and gonorrhea, this liquid mixture caused roughly 100 known deaths, mainly throughout the American Southeast and Midwest, in 1937. Martin opens with a history of a pharmacological revolution, circa the early 1900s, when chemists from all the major pharmaceutical companies were eager to devise the next miracle cure. The book then details, with language and specifics best deciphered by science enthusiasts, how the rogue chemist Harold Cole Watkins of the S.E. Massengill Company, in Bristol, Tenn., combined sulfanilamide, a safe and widely prescribed antibiotic, with diethylene glycol, a known toxin that often produced a deadly outcome when consumed. In play-by-play fashion, Martin chronicles the painstaking removal of the lethal tincture from various states, which took place at a time when forms of communication were limited to newspaper, radio, telegram and even knocking on patients’ doors. The book feels like a compendium of facts, including physicians’ and patients’ names, notable dates and common symptoms, which invariably were abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting and anuria. It does address the larger issues of the times, including wildly lax drug regulations, lenient physician and pharmacist accountability, and problems locating patients because of incomplete or nonexistent patient records. The last 100 pages detail Elixir Sulfanilamide deaths and their distribution by state and race. Martin veers from the dissertationlike structure of the book when she discusses individual victims, including one mother who wrote to President Franklin D. Roosevelt (whose own son was successfully treated with sulfanilamide tablets) about the loss of her daughter. Political and legal implications are also addressed, particularly as they relate to the S.E. Massengill Company, the Food and Drug Administration laws, the victims’ families, and the physicians and druggists involved. Some doctors denied having written prescriptions for the elixir, while some pharmacists sold them without a prescription. To contemporize the event, Martin lists countries that have continued to suffer diethylene glycol poisoning, including China in 2006.
A comprehensive account of an American drug calamity.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: 978-0615898179
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Barkerry Press
Review Posted Online: Feb. 24, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
In more ways than one, a tale about young creatures testing their wings; a moving, entertaining winner.
A fifth-grade New Orleans girl discovers a mysterious chrysalis containing an unexpected creature in this middle-grade novel.
Jacquelyn Marie Johnson, called Jackie, is a 10-year-old African-American girl, the second oldest and the only girl of six siblings. She’s responsible, smart, and enjoys being in charge; she likes “paper dolls and long division and imagining things she had never seen.” Normally, Jackie has no trouble obeying her strict but loving parents. But when her potted snapdragon acquires a peculiar egg or maybe a chrysalis (she dubs it a chrysalegg), Jackie’s strong desire to protect it runs up against her mother’s rule against plants in the house. Jackie doesn’t exactly mean to lie, but she tells her mother she needs to keep the snapdragon in her room for a science project and gets permission. Jackie draws the chrysalegg daily, waiting for something to happen as it gets larger. When the amazing creature inside breaks free, Jackie is more determined than ever to protect it, but this leads her further into secrets and lies. The results when her parents find out are painful, and resolving the problem will take courage, honesty, and trust. Dumas (Jaden Toussaint, the Greatest: Episode 5, 2017, etc.) presents a very likable character in Jackie. At 10, she’s young enough to enjoy playing with paper dolls but has a maturity that even older kids can lack. She’s resourceful, as when she wants to measure a red spot on the chrysalegg; lacking calipers, she fashions one from her hairpin. Jackie’s inward struggle about what to obey—her dearest wishes or the parents she loves—is one many readers will understand. The book complicates this question by making Jackie’s parents, especially her mother, strict (as one might expect to keep order in a large family) but undeniably loving and protective as well—it’s not just a question of outwitting clueless adults. Jackie’s feelings about the creature (tender and responsible but also more than a little obsessive) are similarly shaded rather than black-and-white. The ending suggests that an intriguing sequel is to come.
In more ways than one, a tale about young creatures testing their wings; a moving, entertaining winner.Pub Date: Nov. 11, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-943169-32-0
Page Count: 212
Publisher: Plum Street Press
Review Posted Online: Feb. 22, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A YA novel that treats its subject and its readers with respect while delivering an engaging story.
In the ninth book in the Bluford young-adult series, a young Latino man walks away from violence—but at great personal cost.
In a large Southern California city, 16-year-old Martin Luna hangs out on the fringes of gang life. He’s disaffected, fatherless and increasingly drawn into the orbit of the older, rougher Frankie. When a stray bullet kills Martin’s adored 8-year-old brother, Huero, Martin seems to be heading into a life of crime. But Martin’s mother, determined not to lose another son, moves him to another neighborhood—the fictional town of Bluford, where he attends the racially diverse Bluford High. At his new school, the still-grieving Martin quickly makes enemies and gets into trouble. But he also makes friends with a kind English teacher and catches the eye of Vicky, a smart, pretty and outgoing Bluford student. Martin’s first-person narration supplies much of the book’s power. His dialogue is plain, but realistic and believable, and the authors wisely avoid the temptation to lard his speech with dated and potentially embarrassing slang. The author draws a vivid and affecting picture of Martin’s pain and confusion, bringing a tight-lipped teenager to life. In fact, Martin’s character is so well drawn that when he realizes the truth about his friend Frankie, readers won’t feel as if they are watching an after-school special, but as though they are observing the natural progression of Martin’s personal growth. This short novel appears to be aimed at urban teens who don’t often see their neighborhoods portrayed in young-adult fiction, but its sophisticated characters and affecting story will likely have much wider appeal.
A YA novel that treats its subject and its readers with respect while delivering an engaging story.Pub Date: Jan. 1, 2004
ISBN: 978-1591940173
Page Count: 152
Publisher: Townsend Press
Review Posted Online: Jan. 26, 2013
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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