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  • Article

Drugs in Victorian Britain

Many common remedies were taken throughout the 19th century, with more people than ever using them. What was the social and cultural context of this development?

  • Article

Deadly doses and the hardest of hard drugs

The invention of the modern hypodermic syringe meant we could get high – or accidentally die – faster than before. Find out how this medical breakthrough was adapted for deadly uses.

  • Article

Drug sharing in desperate times

When Nicole was threatened with deportation, her mental health deteriorated. Now without a job, a passport or a doctor, she depends on others to send her their leftover anxiety drugs.

  • Long read

Primodos, paternalism and the fight to be heard

Journalist Florence Wildblood examines the case of Primodos – a conveniently quick but risky hormone pregnancy test that was prescribed in the 1960s and ’70s – and profiles two women at the story’s shocking heart.

All stories (48)

Images

  • Anaesthesia exhibition, October 1946; first showcase: narcotic and stimulating drugs.
  • Senecio pulcher Hook.&Arn. Asteraceae Distribution: South America. It has not attracted attention as a medicinal or toxic plant but members of the genus Senecio contain pyrrolizidine alkaloids that are toxic to the liver and may cause liver cancer. A traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) product, Qianbai Biyan Pian, contains Senecio scandens which contains the unsaturated pyrrolizidine alkaloids, senecionine and seneciphylline. This is now a banned drug. (Safety of Herbal Medicinal Products, July 2002, Medicines Control Agency). Photographed in the Medicinal Garden of the Royal College of Physicians, London.
  • Senecio pulcher Hook.&Arn. Asteraceae Distribution: South America. It has not attracted attention as a medicinal or toxic plant but members of the genus Senecio contain pyrrolizidine alkaloids that are toxic to the liver and may cause liver cancer. A traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) product, Qianbai Biyan Pian, contains Senecio scandens which contains the unsaturated pyrrolizidine alkaloids, senecionine and seneciphylline. This is now a banned drug. (Safety of Herbal Medicinal Products, July 2002, Medicines Control Agency). Photographed in the Medicinal Garden of the Royal College of Physicians, London.
  • Solanum laciniatum Aiton Solanaceae. Kangaroo Apple. Evergreen shrub. Distribution: New Zealand and the east coast of Australia. It contains steroidal saponins that can be converted into steroids, including progesterone, oestrogens, cortisone, prednisolone etc. In 1943, Professor Russell Marker discovered a method of obtaining an unsaturated steroidal saponine, diosogenin, from Mexican yam (Dioscorea mexicana), which can easily and cheaply be converted into steroids, such as prednisone and progesterone, reducing the price of steroid production to a fraction (0.5%) of its former cost. For 20 years drug companies showed little interest, and it was only as a result of Professor Marker forming his own company, and the concerted efforts of several gynaecologists, physiologists and birth-control advocates, that the contraceptive pill was ‘born’ in 1960. Photographed in the Medicinal Garden of the Royal College of Physicians, London.
  • A woman pushes a trolley down a dilapidated street in Lima, Peru representing poverty; with 4 smaller images depicting social issues associated with AIDS including packets of money in bank safes, drugs and male prostitutes; an AIDS prevention advertisement by Pecos, the Programa Especial de Control del SIDA. Colour lithograph by Juan L. Gargurevich, ca. 1995.
  • Guidelines for the management of acute paracetamol overdose in Ethiopia. Colour lithograph by DACA, ca. 2000.
  • International exhibition on wellness, health and medicine in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Colour lithograph for Prana Promotion, 2010.
  • Ventolin rotacaps.
  • Ventolin rotacaps.
  • Ventolin rotacaps.
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