Injecting Pure Food Products Like Honey

[molten]

This topic is not about boring and limiting theories, or social norms.

Has anyone heard of real life cases of humans or animals being injected stuff like this (into what?) and what were the real life results?

[ftg]

Honey can contain botulism spores. (Hence it should not be given to babies.)

Adults with fully developed immune systems plus stomach acids can usually kill them.

Injecting honey would bypass a key line of defense. Not a good idea.

(Sample case.)

[brossa]

Coconut water has been used as an IV fluid from time to time.

[outlierrn]

I would predict a glob of honey acting much like a blood clot in your brain or lungs.

[Treppenwitz]

Is dissolution/dilution allowed? Dextrose (glucose) is a “food product”, and that’s routinely infused/injected for medical reasons. Ref.

Glucose 5% is indicated for the treatment of carbohydrate and fluid depletion.

Glucose 5% is also used as a vehicle and diluent for compatible medicinal products for parenteral administration.

Same for salt (saline), of course.

I’m sure there’s a case of whiskey being infused (a medical case, not a case of whiskey), I think to treat methanol poisoning (ref: QI - can’t find a link right now). There’s this for Brandy (section 3, para 4).

j

[DinoR]

I’d guess that the methanol poisoning treatment that Treppenwitz points out is more likely to just be grain alcohol (grain alcohol with residual water). Whiskey in the role, with it’s flavoring components, seems unnecessary unless it’s an emergency and that’s all that’s at hand.

As a real world example of direct injection, there’s the dad of one of my friends in high school. He was a surgeon. At some big milestone in his residency he and his peers had an ethanol IV party. Controlled dosing and no upset stomachs! They also, IIRC, followed up with saline and B vitamin IV chasers to fight the hangover. The real life results were they got pretty drunk and generally felt fine the next day.

[nearwildheaven]

@outlierrn

I would predict a glob of honey acting much like a blood clot in your brain or lungs.

If administered intravenously, that could potentially happen. However, a thick substance like honey? More likely, it would have been given sub-Q or IM, or even rectally.

[mbh]

Not food, per se, but a cousin of mine was persuaded to have beeswax injected under his scalp, to cure baldness. He went bald anyway. For years, he looked like he had a mild case of hydrocephalus. He eventually had it removed surgically.

[Treppenwitz]

@DinoR

I’d guess that the methanol poisoning treatment that Treppenwitz points out is more likely to just be grain alcohol (grain alcohol with residual water). Whiskey in the role, with it’s flavoring components, seems unnecessary unless it’s an emergency and that’s all that’s at hand…

It was QI and I found a link.

A bottle of whisky can save your life because if you have some form of trauma and have ethanol in your system you are more likely to survive. In one documentary case a New Zealand chef called Duthie went literally blind drunk after a vodka binge, most likely because he was on diabetic medication at the time and the vodka turned it into formaldehyde. Usually the way to cure this is using an ethanol drip, but at the hospital he went to there was no ethanol so they used a bottle of Johnnie Walker Black Label from an off licence instead.

Actually, now I have more details, there are quite a lot of links to news reports. Here’s one.

j

ETA - though it doesn’t look like this qualifies as injected or infused.

[Alpha_Twit]

It might be pure urban legend but I seem to recall that injections of milk were though to be an effective, improvised treatment for heroin overdoses. I know I have seen this shown on the TV show Emergency! and I’ve heard it from a couple of other pop culture sources. That doesn’t mean that anyone ever took this seriously in real life.

[Jackmannii]

In one documentary (sic) case a New Zealand chef called Duthie went literally blind drunk after a vodka binge, most likely because he was on diabetic medication at the time and the vodka turned it into formaldehyde.

This sounded fishy so I looked up a report in the NZ Herald on the case.

Apparently doctors suspected methanol poisoning and metabolism into formaldehyde, and treated the patient with ethanol.

Sounds like the guy drank bootleg booze instead of having a medication reaction.

[Dana_Scully]

@outlierrn

I would predict a glob of honey acting much like a blood clot in your brain or lungs.

as opposed to what?

[Dana_Scully]

@nearwildheaven

If administered intravenously, that could potentially happen. However, a thick substance like honey? More likely, it would have been given sub-Q or IM, or even rectally.

EEEEEEEEEEEEK! trying to give a honey enema? I don’t think so! :smack:

[outlierrn]

@Dana_Scully

EEEEEEEEEEEEK! trying to give a honey enema? I don’t think so! :smack:

Huh, hadn’t seen this before, but milk and molasses enemas are a thing. Effective, too.