# Botulinum toxin: that potent?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/botulinum-toxin-that-potent/164456
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [March 27, 2003, 4:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/botulinum-toxin-that-potent/164456 "2003-03-27T04:16:32Z")
**Posts on this page:** 9
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@tonbo0422](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tonbo0422)
#### Post date: [March 27, 2003, 4:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/botulinum-toxin-that-potent/164456/1 "2003-03-27T04:16:32Z")
I just read today that an amount of botulinum toxin the weight of a paper clip could kill 1,000,000 people.
This sounds as ridiculous as that old saw “a teaspoon of the matter of a dwarf star weighs as much as the Earth.”
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### Author:  [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)
#### Post date: [March 27, 2003, 4:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/botulinum-toxin-that-potent/164456/2 "2003-03-27T04:51:51Z")
The lethal dose (50%) for injected botulinum toxin A in mice is ~1ng/kg. It’s estimated that human LD50 is ~40ng/kg. For a 150Lb (68 kg) person, a lethal dose would about 2.7 ug. With a paperclip weighing in at ~5 grams, you’d have enough toxin for ~1.8 million lethal injections.
[http://www.ibc.arizona.edu/WebBiosafetyman/Appen6.html](http://www.ibc.arizona.edu/WebBiosafetyman/Appen6.html)
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### Author:  [@Lorenzo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lorenzo)
#### Post date: [March 27, 2003, 5:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/botulinum-toxin-that-potent/164456/3 "2003-03-27T05:01:18Z")
I think your stat is a theoretical maximum by injection. I’m not sure how easy it would be to divide 5 grams of botulinum toxin into 1,000,000 equal parts, though.
On a practical level, botulinum toxin is usually contracted in the general population via food borne illness. The death rate of people eating food infected with botulinum toxin is high but nowhere near 50%. Many who ate the botulinum toxin infected onions at “The Skewer Inn” in Peoria survived it.
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### Author:  [@curly\_chick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/curly_chick)
#### Post date: [March 27, 2003, 9:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/botulinum-toxin-that-potent/164456/4 "2003-03-27T09:28:31Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Lorenzo \*
> \*\*I think your stat is a theoretical maximum by injection. I’m not sure how easy it would be to divide 5 grams of botulinum toxin into 1,000,000 equal parts, though.
>
> \*\*
Very easy
Take 5g of it and dissolve it in 1,000 litres and inject a ml into each of your 1,000,000 victims.
Or you could take 5 g of it, dissolve it on a 5,000 litres and give everyone two teaspoons (5ml) of the mixture.
In chemistry and biology labs a solution such as this, 5000 ppm (meaning 5000 parts per million) is not unusual.
Far, far lower concentrations can be made, and in some spheres, parts per billion and parts per trillion solutions are in routine use.
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### Author:  [@DougC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DougC)
#### Post date: [March 27, 2003, 11:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/botulinum-toxin-that-potent/164456/5 "2003-03-27T11:22:19Z")
-
-
- So anyone got any good buzzard recipes? A pal was once told by an old-timer in his neighborhood that buzzards (and vultures, I guess) have enough residual botulin in their blood stream from what they eat that no other mammals can possibly eat buzzard meat. He said that every other animal that’s poisonous can be killed and the toxic part removed, but with buzzards the whole thing is toxic. Obviously it doesn’t take a whole heck of a lot to be too toxic for a human to stomache, but I still am wondering if this is true. Anybody else know?
~
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### Author:  [@antechinus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/antechinus)
#### Post date: [March 27, 2003, 12:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/botulinum-toxin-that-potent/164456/6 "2003-03-27T12:18:29Z")
“_could_ kill 1,000,000 people.”
It is a big could.
It is easy dividing the toxin evenly into 1 millions part, but delivering is not practicable.
The botulin toxin would have to enter the bloodstream directly to have a fatal result, otherwise medical attention can save the patient.
Mexican guerillas during the Mexican revolution cultivated botulism as a weapon. This was delivered via a number of different modes to the blodstreams of victims, although it was also used to poison water and food.
Botulism would not be a practical WMD, since it cannot be delivered en mass. Similar story to ricin.
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### Author:  [@curly\_chick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/curly_chick)
#### Post date: [March 27, 2003, 12:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/botulinum-toxin-that-potent/164456/7 "2003-03-27T12:32:14Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*\*
>
> The botulin toxin would have to enter the bloodstream directly to have a fatal result, otherwise medical attention can save the patient.
>
> \*\*
That is interesting. Why is that?
Why does the toxin have to be injected into the bloodstream?
_Clostridium botulinum_ is a spore forming bacteria which causes food poisoning because the endo(or is it exo? I can’t remember) toxin produced is eaten by a person while they eat the food in which the _C. botulinum_ was growing, not when they inject the food.
Why is the mechanism different?
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### Author:  [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)
#### Post date: [March 27, 2003, 12:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/botulinum-toxin-that-potent/164456/8 "2003-03-27T12:47:35Z")
> [@](#):
>
> That is interesting. Why is that?
> Why does the toxin have to be injected into the bloodstream?
I think its the direct dose. The human body can survive a single nasty shock by the toxin, but if not injected, the body has more defences against it. That is, not all of it will attack your system. Put it straight into the blood, and then many of our poison defences can’t help you.
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### Author:  [@antechinus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/antechinus)
#### Post date: [March 28, 2003, 6:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/botulinum-toxin-that-potent/164456/9 "2003-03-28T06:42:22Z")
If the toxin is directed through the skin the concentation in the bloodstream will be greater than being absorbed via stomach, thus causing more nerve damage and more likelihood of death for the same dose.