# Any chance of bullshyte story being true? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [March 18, 2021, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-chance-of-bullshyte-story-being-true/938194 "2021-03-18T16:39:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![SciFiSam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/47e85d/32.png) [@SciFiSam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SciFiSam)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2021, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-chance-of-bullshyte-story-being-true/938194/61 "2021-03-22T03:57:59Z")
> [@RivkahChaya](#): > > I don’t think that’s going to discourage a really determined suicide. It does help you keep track of whether you took a dose or not, especially if you are post-surgical, and generally groggy and out of sorts. A lot of people accidentally overdose on painkillers, because they take one, fall asleep for an hour, wake up, and can’t remember whether they’ve taken one in the last four hours or not. No, it won’t. But not all suicides are from people who are really determined to kill themselves. Every little step you put in the way gives people a chance to reconsider. Blister packs really are there as a suicide prevention method: > **[Why Can't You Buy a Big Bottle of Headache Pills in England? - Freakonomics](https://freakonomics.com/2011/05/why-cant-you-buy-a-big-bottle-of-headache-pills-in-england/)** > > Last time I was in London I had a headache, and went to the nearest Boots to buy something for it. In U.S. drugstores, I'm accustomed to finding half an aisle devoted to headache pills, with bottles ranging from small to very large -- at least 200... From there: “And again, you’d think all I have to do is go to six drugstores, you know, buy packets in each of them, all I have to do is just tear them out. But it has cut down the number of overdoses. It’s also cut down the number of serious overdoses that have led to kidney damage. Now, very few people died of an acetaminophen overdose. So it’s been hard to document that it cut the number of deaths, but certainly the number of attempts. The overdoses with it have been cut dramatically.” All other medications you can easily overdose with are in blister packs, not just this one, so the same barriers are in place for every easy-to-access drug. You can also only get large amounts of paracetamol/tylenol on prescription. The situation you describe, where someone ends up taking maybe twice the dose of paracetamol once or twice over a few days of illness, really isn’t serious enough to count as an overdose and is hugely unlikely to end up in a hospital admission. It could be an issue if you do it every day for weeks on end, though, and might be one of the other reasons for choosing blister packs as the norm in the UK. ---
**Author:** ![RivkahChaya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rivkahchaya/32/8919_2.png) [@RivkahChaya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RivkahChaya)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2021, 4:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-chance-of-bullshyte-story-being-true/938194/62 "2021-03-22T04:07:16Z")
When I worked in community living services, we had all our clients getting their drugs from Walmart, because Walmart would put drugs in blister packs that didn’t normally come that way, and label them, either one monthly pack with a dose/day, or four weekly packs with up to four doses/day. They could include several pills in each blister. We had lots of clients who were mildly MR, mildly autistic, or brain-injured, who managed mostly independently, but needed this assistance. So I can see how it would be a big deal to someone post-surgical as well. I can’t tell you whether Walmart still does this, or is still the only place doing it. ---
**Author:** ![SciFiSam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/47e85d/32.png) [@SciFiSam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SciFiSam)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2021, 4:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-chance-of-bullshyte-story-being-true/938194/63 "2021-03-22T04:19:50Z")
Yes, it definitely assists in those ways too. In the UK almost all tablet or capsule medications are sold in that way to everyone, and have been for a long time, and the reason stated was that it helps prevent suicide, but it certainly has other benefits that mean it’s continued. BTW that sounds like a really good pharmacist that cares about their customers - good on them. ---
**Author:** ![nelliebly](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nelliebly/32/5422_2.png) [@nelliebly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nelliebly)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2021, 5:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-chance-of-bullshyte-story-being-true/938194/64 "2021-03-22T05:49:59Z")
> [@nearwildheaven](#): > > I’ve seen lemon-flavored cod liver oil, and castor oil, at my local natural-foods store. Haven’t tried either of them. Don’t. Imagine the most disgusting thing you could possibly taste…say, liver and really oily fish. Now imagine that with a few drops of lemon oil. If your first response isn’t “blech,” you’re not imagining hard enough. > [@RivkahChaya](#): > > Well, at least you can know it wasn’t a pointless exercise-- you were getting Omega 3s, and vitamins A & D. Can’t speak for BippityBoppityBoo, but I’d rather have had any other source of all those…say, salmon patties or croquettes, and I hated salmon. Back then, salmon came in cans only (This was Illinois.), and it usually contained cartilage. I loathed those bony little surprises. I’d have eaten canned salmon for a week to avoid cod liver oil. OTOH, I liked the little illustration on the back of Desitin of a dismayed cod with a faucet on its stomach. I guess misery really does love company. ---
**Author:** ![Asuka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@Asuka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Asuka)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2021, 9:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-chance-of-bullshyte-story-being-true/938194/65 "2021-03-22T09:38:10Z")
In terms of “orphanage experiments” I remember hearing, my high school biology teacher claimed in the late 1940s in an Eastern European country there were so many war orphons especially infants the state decided to do an experiment where they took 100 infants and put them into two groups, a control group of normal caring, and the experiment group where the infants would be left to their own devices for all of the day except for feeding and we’re isolated in their cribs. The experiment group initially cried their eyes out for an entire day before realizing no help was coming and seemed to gain a bit of independence to them no longer crying for anything. But after a week of no real social interaction/reassurances the infants began to slowly refuse to eat until they died and the remaining babies who survived had severe psychological problems and significantly lowered IQs. Anyone know if this was BS because it sounds it. ---
**Author:** ![Filbert](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/filbert/32/3433_2.png) [@Filbert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Filbert)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2021, 10:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-chance-of-bullshyte-story-being-true/938194/66 "2021-03-22T10:28:45Z")
> [@RivkahChaya](#): > > I don’t think that’s going to discourage a really determined suicide It can deter the less determined though, especially in combination with the quantity restrictions. I used to know someone who told me once that they had planned out a suicide by overdose of OTC painkillers- looked up the quantities required, worked out the lethal dose for her weight, even got a pestle and mortar having read that it was easier to take that quantity if they were ground up. Went to go buy the pills… and got bored queueing at the second or third shop, so gave up and went home. This had been several years earlier. ---
**Author:** ![RivkahChaya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rivkahchaya/32/8919_2.png) [@RivkahChaya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RivkahChaya)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2021, 10:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-chance-of-bullshyte-story-being-true/938194/67 "2021-03-22T10:58:05Z")
> [@nelliebly](#): > > Can’t speak for BippityBoppityBoo, but I’d rather have had any other source of all those Oh, I would too. I was sick once, while in my grandmother’s care, and eating poorly, and so she took it on herself to dose me with that. It made me vomit with great force. When my mother came home, she explained to my grandmother about “Flintstones chewables.” My mother didn’t normally give us vitamins, but when we were sick, she gave us one in the morning, and one at night. Have no idea where she got this, or whether it did any good. Didn’t get any Omega 3s from it, but my mother was also a great believer in an egg a day, so I ate one every single damn day I was at home, from about 10 months to 14 years. When I was about 10, and started getting up before anyone else, and getting my own breakfasts, she started hard-boiling about 8 at a time, and told me to eat one every morning. When she was out of the country for 8 months researching for her dissertation, in every letter, she asked my father whether he was making sure we got our eggs. Actually, by then I’d learned to scramble them myself. > [@Asuka](#): > > the experiment group where the infants would be left to their own devices for all of the day except for feeding and we’re isolated in their cribs There are a lot of stories about similar experiments. There’s one where “a king,” never named, takes several babies from their mothers to be raised by nurses who tend to them kindly, but never speak to them, nor play with them much, because it miht lead to accidental outbursts of speech. The king wants to see what language they spontaneously speak if they are not exposed to one. Supposedly, they all died before their first birthdays. Aside from the fact that there are similar stories circulating, and they are definitely ULs, really, conditions in E. European orphanages are pretty bleak, and babies do get left in cribs to cry for long periods. My step-SIL adopted, with her wife, a boy from a Russian orphanage (and a remote one, not a Moscow orphanage) who was about 15 months old. He very rarely cried nor did anything to call attention to his needs. He did not even complain when he was sick once. They had to “reteach” him to express himself. Any time he showed a little bit of anything, or cried even slightly, they made a huge fuss over him, and he saw a behavioral therapist who did a lot of work with identifying and labeling emotions. He’s in high school now, and you’d never know he had a rough start, nor anything but the same upbringing as his US peers. ---
**Author:** ![RivkahChaya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rivkahchaya/32/8919_2.png) [@RivkahChaya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RivkahChaya)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2021, 11:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-chance-of-bullshyte-story-being-true/938194/68 "2021-03-22T11:22:59Z")
> [@Filbert](#): > > especially in combination with the quantity restrictions Well, yeah. But you can quantity-restrict with bottles as well. When I was in Costa Rica, I was surprised to find out that OTC pain meds, and even band-aids and Q-Tips-- everything-- are sold just a few at a time-- or one at a time, if that’s all you want. When I had my period, and wanted to buy 15 naproxen they very carefully showed me the blister packs, and counted to 15, because they thought I might not know what I was saying in Spanish-- maybe I meant “cinco” and not “quince.” No, I really wanted quince. Actually, I’d take the whole box, if they’d sell it-- “Dios mío!” we don’t sell by the box-- that’s _ **60!** _ ¡Esta es una locura! “OK. But as long as they come in packs of 6, can you sell me 18?” “18?” “18. Three packs of six.” Another time, I wanted a box of Band-Aids, and they didn’t sell them by the box. As many as you needed at the moment, plus a couple more, maybe. I talked them into selling me 20, by saying it was for a First Aid kit I was taking on an excursion. (It wasn’t.) There was another time I tripped and cut my knee, though, and stepped into a pharmacy on the next block. Bought two Band-Aids, and some antibiotic ointment, which the pharmacist squeezed from a tube into a little cup. Cost the equivalent of about 40¢. Also got some hand sanitizer gratis before I put the ointment on the cut. ---
**Author:** ![markn\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f9ae1b/32.png) [@markn\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/markn_1)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2021, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-chance-of-bullshyte-story-being-true/938194/69 "2021-03-22T16:51:18Z")
> [@RivkahChaya](#): > > There’s one where “a king,” never named, takes several babies from their mothers to be raised by nurses who tend to them kindly, but never speak to them, nor play with them much, because it miht lead to accidental outbursts of speech. The king wants to see what language they spontaneously speak if they are not exposed to one. Supposedly, they all died before their first birthdays. This sounds like a version of the [story](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_deprivation_experiments) in Herodotus’ _Histories_ about the Egyptian pharaoh Psamtik, who had two newborns raised without any exposure to language. Supposedly the result was that the babies spontaneously spoke the Phyrgian word “bekos” (bread) and Psamtik concluded that Phyrgian was the original human language. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2021, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-chance-of-bullshyte-story-being-true/938194/70 "2021-03-22T23:14:37Z")
No, it’s not just Walmart. Lots of community or independent pharmacies stay solvent by offering this service. There are also several companies that will do this for anyone who wants it, even if they aren’t mentally or physically disabled and/or on huge numbers of meds. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2021, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-chance-of-bullshyte-story-being-true/938194/71 "2021-03-22T23:22:22Z")
I’ve never lived in, or even visited, a place like that, but I have definitely heard about poverty-stricken regions where you could buy a sewing needle, or three Q-tips, or half an onion, if that was all you needed (or all you could afford). Bulk purchasing just isn’t done because the people, for a multitude of reasons, live literally in the here and now; they’ll worry about tomorrow when it’s tomorrow. I have definitely seen reports about orphanages in places like China and Romania where the children didn’t cry, because they knew nobody would come, and also American children where that was also the case. ---
**Author:** ![RivkahChaya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rivkahchaya/32/8919_2.png) [@RivkahChaya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RivkahChaya)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2021, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-chance-of-bullshyte-story-being-true/938194/72 "2021-03-23T00:15:16Z")
> [@nearwildheaven](#): > > No, it’s not just Walmart. Probably now-- but this was 20 years ago, and locally, the only place was Walmart. ---
**Author:** ![Dr\_Paprika](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr_paprika/32/3042_2.png) [@Dr\_Paprika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr_Paprika)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2021, 1:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-chance-of-bullshyte-story-being-true/938194/73 "2021-03-23T01:27:48Z")
Tylenol is the most common overdose I have seen. However, there is an antidote that works well, and the many cases I have seen left the ICU okay. In England I have heard they stopped selling large bottles of acetaminophen but I cannot confirm this. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2021, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-chance-of-bullshyte-story-being-true/938194/74 "2021-03-23T19:57:45Z")
I still see 500-count bottles of acetaminophen here in the U.S. Acetylcysteine does work well, but it has to be started within 24 hours of exposure or it’s too late. It also has to be administered via NG tube because it smells and tastes so bad. It’s a huge loading dose, followed by 17 smaller doses at 4-hour intervals. ---
**Author:** ![carrps](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carrps/32/2957_2.png) [@carrps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carrps)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2021, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-chance-of-bullshyte-story-being-true/938194/75 "2021-03-23T23:59:22Z")
> [@FairyChatMom](#): > > So, anecdotally, I think it’s more of a learned behavior. Similarly, when I was a kid, sweets were a reward, and the notion of self-reward when I had my own money to spend led to a life-long battle with my weight. Oh, man, do I identify with this. We got candy twice a year – Halloween and Christmas. I’m still dealing with it. ---
**Author:** ![SciFiSam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/47e85d/32.png) [@SciFiSam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SciFiSam)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2021, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-chance-of-bullshyte-story-being-true/938194/76 "2021-03-24T00:33:10Z")
> [@Dr\_Paprika](#): > > In England I have heard they stopped selling large bottles of acetaminophen but I cannot confirm this That’s what I was talking about above. Provided a cite, too. ---
**Author:** ![kitap](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/b9e5f3/32.png) [@kitap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kitap)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2021, 9:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-chance-of-bullshyte-story-being-true/938194/77 "2021-03-28T09:51:56Z")
> [@nearwildheaven](#): > > No, it’s not just Walmart. Lots of community or independent pharmacies stay solvent by offering this service. There are also several companies that will do this for anyone who wants it, even if they aren’t mentally or physically disabled and/or on huge numbers of meds. I worked my way through college at a privately owned pharmacy that only serviced nursing homes. There was a contraption called the pill machine by everyone that put drugs into individual pouches. Us techs would tear off as many as the drug cassette (i.e. the patient’s drawer) needed for what was called the fill. ---
**Author:** ![bob\_2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bob_2/32/3341_2.png) [@bob\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bob_2)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2021, 1:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-chance-of-bullshyte-story-being-true/938194/78 "2021-03-28T13:31:11Z")
I think that the point of it is that if you _really_ want to kill yourself, you probably will, but for most attempted suicides it is more a spur of the moment thing, and having a bottle of 200 paracetamol in the cupboard might just be enough to do the trick. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-chance-of-bullshyte-story-being-true/938194.md?page=3)