Medicine: Deadly Confusion

It happened again last week. The scene of the tragedy was New London, Conn.’s Lawrence & Memorial Associated Hospitals. This time it was a woman pharmacist, who mistook boric acid for dextrose (the crystals look much alike) in filling some bottles with babies’ formulas. Result of a four-day diet of boric acid to 23 babies: four dead, several others sick, the pharmacist in bed with nervous collapse.