The Poisoner's Handbook

Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age of New York - by Deborah Blum.

This book has one heck of a catchy title.  It also can draw some worried looks from people who take a glance at what you are reading, and slowly inch away.  It is the fascinating tale of the birth of modern toxicology in the 1920s and 1930s.  In my professional life, I work closely with toxicologists to receive pertinent health information to protect workers.  So this book connected the current field with its origins for me.  The origins stemmed from the need to track down criminals for poisoning cases, and later evolved to include workplace toxins.  Too often, the courts would let probable criminals go free due to a lack of analytical methods or vice versa, send innocents to the Sing Sing facility in New York for execution.

Each chapter is dedicated to a poison, and gives case studies of how methods were developed relative to certain crimes taking place, mainly in New York City.  Charles Norris is the chief medical examiner that ultimately sets a model to be replicated across the U.S. for how forensic medicine should be conducted.  His overworked, underpaid, yet dedicated employee, Alexander Gettner laid the foundation for many analytical techniques that came to cited in medical textbooks and as part of the forensics program for the MDs in New York.  The poisons include: chloroform, wood alcohol, cyanides, arsenic, mercury, carbon monoxide, methyl alcohol, radium, ethyl alcohol and thallium.  What amazed me was how readily available these toxins were at the pharmacy or hardware store.  Some were known to be toxic (the arsenic and cyanides used for pest control) yet others were touted as health tonics (radium water for a healthy glow).

Despite Gettner and Norris' work, the creation of stronger safety regulations and the creation of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration OSHA, we still face many of these poisons today.  Undoubtedly, there will be cases of carbon monoxide deaths this winter due to poorly maintained furnaces and space heaters.  We are still dealing with lead clean-up in homes and soils.  There are still concerns about toys containing lead paint.  The older poisons have been well characterized in terms of their health effects, how to treat them and how to prevent illness in the first place.  But there are 1000's of new chemicals being produced each year, and we have to keep our eyes on them.  Just because there aren't immediate health effects, doesn't mean there aren't longer term health or environmental effects.

The author has to cover some gory details in her tale - the results of autopsies and acts of murderers, but she does it in a way that did not leave me feeling too disturbed.  Instead, I felt empathy for Norris and Gettner as they tried to advance their field in a way to keep up or even ahead of the criminals.  They took it personally if the jury did not understand their evidence, and worked hard to learn from their mistakes and not work harder on the next case.

This is definitely a book I would recommend to anyone in a public health or preventative health field.  The organic chemistry discussed may be a little off-putting to some, but you don't need a major in chemistry to get through the book.