Deadly Boric Acid?

Generations of American, mothers have kept boric-acid powder in the medicine chest, believing it to be a harmless remedy for assorted ills such as eye inflammation, diaper rash or prickly heat. Last week Dr. Russell S. Fisher, Maryland's chief medical examiner, told the College cf American Pathologists that boric acid can kill.

Fisher was not talking about the cases where the baby swallows boric-acid solution, or the powder gets mixed with the feeding formula by mistake. The news in his report was that the chemical can sometimes be absorbed through breaks in the skin in sufficient quantities to be fatal.

The seemingly mysterious deaths of six babies, from three weeks to seven months old (four in Baltimore, one in Boston, one in New York City) were traced .by Dr. Fisher to boric-acid poisoning. The supposedly soothing chemical had been absorbed through inflamed skin and had damaged tissues in the pancreas, liver and kidneys. Young babies are especially susceptible, Fisher thinks; he has found no fatalities in infants over seven months. Further finding: there is little danger with commercial baby powders in which boric acid is diluted with inert talc.

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