I was looking through my Upjohn bottle collection and noticed this Rhubarb and Blue Mass Pills. Blue Mass is the name for a formulation of mercury or mercury chloride that has been used for centuries. It was for treatment of syphillis and constipation.

 

Rhubarb and mercury seemed like an odd combination but I found it is not. Some of you will know that rhubarb has laxative properties and helps with constipation. So these pills, made between 1888 and 1902, were given to patients to treat constipation.

 

Each pill contains 1 3/4 grains, which is 113 milligrams, of mercury. The World Health Organization currently recommends that mercury exposure in food be no more than 2 micrograms per kilograms of body weight per week. For an 80 kilogram (176 pounds) person, each of these pills would be 700 times higher than the current weekly safe limit for mercury.