On September 13, 2009, the First People's Hospital of Zhejiang Province and the Children's Hospital of Zhejiang Province received the same batch of patients poisoned by unknown chemicals.
When they were sent to the hospital, almost all patients experienced symptoms such as fatigue, excessive sweating, thirst, chest tightness, dizziness, and yellowing of the skin of the hands and feet. Severe patients even have sweat dyed yellow hair and clothing, in addition to severe shortness of breath, palpitations.
This batch of poisoned patients a total of 21 people, of which 1 person has died before, the remaining 20 people sent to the hospital for treatment, 2 people suddenly have general tonic spasms, breathing, cardiac arrest, rescue ineffective death.
Seeing such a major poisoning incident, people who don't know about it may think that the victims are employees of the chemical plant, but in fact, these 21 people are only involved in one thing together - recycling discarded plastic bags.
This batch of plastic bags from a chemical factory in Zhejiang, employees illegally sold discarded chemical plastic packaging bags to the waste collection station, from the second half of 2008, hoarded for nearly a year, the owner of the waste collection station then sold these plastic packaging bags to the plastic recycling station at a price of 5500 yuan.
Unexpectedly, the process of loading and unloading transport alone poisoned many people. The first to show symptoms was the worker Lin Mou, who suddenly sweated all over his body, his chest was tight and weak, thinking that it was heat stroke, and he died soon after.
Touching these plastic bags were also Lin's family relatives who helped unload the goods, the plastic bags were initially stacked at home, and 7 children played next to them, and they also showed symptoms of poisoning. There is also a case of accidentally affected patients, she did not directly contact the plastic bag, but in the process of caring for the poisoned family, contact with the sweat or clothing of the poisoned person also caused poisoning.
Symptoms of yellowing of the skin of the hands and feet of patients with dinitrophenol poisoning
The source of all this is the plastic bags that have been filled with dinitrophenol.
Dinitrophenol (dnp), strictly speaking, 2,4-dinitrophenol, is a common raw material in industry and can be used in the production of dyes, preservatives, herbicides and explosives.
Although extremely common, dinitrophenol is also extremely dangerous. At the beginning of the 20th century, it appeared in the public eye as an explosive, with an explosive intensity of about 81% of tnt explosives.
Dinitrotoluene is a precursor to picric acid (2,4,6-trinitrophenol), which was first used as a yellow dye and is said to have become a new type of explosive after an explosion caused by violent workers.
During World War I, there were reports of dinitrophenol explosions in ammunition factories that killed dozens of people, and similar deaths occurred in dye factories.
Dinitrophenol is more deadly than its unstable explosive properties in terms of its toxicity. According to Chinese literature, the minimum lethal amount (mld) for humans through oral intervention is 36 mg/kg, and for an adult of 50 kg, oral administration of 1.8 g can be fatal.
However, according to the data given by the real case report, the lethal amount may be even lower, it is generally believed that 10-20 mg/kg can be fatal, the lowest intake in recorded deaths is 4.3 mg/kg, in short, adults oral about 1 g is life-threatening.
Samples of 2,4-dinitrophenol pure compounds
If only lethal amounts are discussed, dinitrophenol and the famous cyanide are at the same level. In addition to the poisoning accidents caused by the residues in the discarded plastic bags mentioned at the beginning, fatal accidents caused by illegal operations are often occurred in industrial production.
In September 2001, a death accident of dinitrophenol poisoning occurred in Linhai City, Zhejiang Province, and Jiang Mou, a worker temporarily employed by the evolution factory, engaged in centrifugal dehydration of dinitrophenol, because he was poisoned without wearing protective equipment, Jiang Mou had symptoms after work, and died at 10:40 p.m. after visiting the hospital.
If we say that because of the widespread use of dinitrophenol in industry, we have to take a certain risk to contact it (of course, according to the operating specifications to do a good job of protection, the health of front-line workers is still guaranteed), this is understandable, but another "dark" application of dinitrophenol is somewhat intriguing.
In the 1930s, doctors at Stanford University discovered that workers who had worked in dye factories or ammunition factories for a long time had a similar set of changes, that is, symptoms caused by dinitrophenol poisoning, and one of the significant changes was weight loss.
They believe that under strict control of intake and close medical observation, dinitrophenol can be avoided from the harm caused by the body, but retain a certain weight loss effect, if the assumption is true, then dinitrophenol is a very potential weight loss miracle drug.
So the research team began to study and published a paper on the treatment of obesity with dinitrophenol, which soon attracted widespread attention. Dinitrophenol is an extremely common substance, so a large number of businessmen quickly started the business of this diet pill.
It is estimated that in 1934 there were about 20 drug wholesalers in the United States selling dinitrophenol, about 100,000 people took it, and it was once touted as the best diet pill.
Dinitrophenol diet pill products and various reports
Objectively speaking, the weight loss effect of dinitrophenol is indeed amazing, and its principle is now clear. Dinitrophenol in the body mainly acts on the energy metabolism process of cells, inhibits the phosphorylation process, so that the energy produced by the oxidation of the energy supply substance can not be used for the synthesis of atp, such substances are also known as "uncoupler".
Since the synthesis of ATP is inhibited and the cell supply is insufficient, our bodies will respond in the conventional way, that is, to accelerate the breakdown of fat to fill the energy gap, but the presence of dinitrophenol makes this response useless.
More and more fat is oxidized and decomposed, but the mitochondria are still unable to synthesize atp, at which point they enter an inactive cycle until dinitrophenol is metabolized out of the body.
So far, we haven't mentioned the most important question – where does the energy of fat go? Diet pills are also subject to energy conservation in accordance with the basic laws of physics, in fact, these energy released through oxidative decomposition are all released in the form of thermal energy.
Our body is like a normal working motor, continuously converting electrical energy into mechanical energy, and dinitrophenol is like a foreign body entering the motor, stuck in the rotor, at this time can not output mechanical energy of the motor equivalent to short circuit, all electrical energy into heat energy, it is easy to burn.
These calories are also the direct cause of sweating, fatigue and chest tightness after poisoning, so dinitrophenol poisoning is often mistaken for heat stroke, resulting in delayed treatment.
In fact, in medicine, it is necessary to establish an animal fever model for the study of antipyretic drugs, dinitrophenol is a commonly used agent that causes fever, and the effect of high doses is rapidly generated by huge heat.
For humans, a higher dose of dinitrophenol at a time, fever can be as high as 43 ° C, at this ultra-high body temperature, our body's temperature-sensitive proteins (such as most enzymes) will not be able to play a normal role, if not taken without treatment will soon die.
But even if the severe patient is sent to the hospital, it is difficult for doctors to turn the tide, there is no specific antidote to dinitrophenol poisoning, the treatment means are relatively limited, the more effective means is blood perfusion, that is, the patient's blood is cleared of toxins through solid adsorbents.
The above is mainly the part of acute poisoning of dinitrophenol, in the short legal sale of a few years, it is also suspected of causing cataracts and other sequelae, so in 1938, the United States completely banned the production and sale of dinitrophenol as a diet pill.
During the Great Depression of the 1930s, the emaciated figure also became a sign of youthful beauty
Perhaps obsessed with its weight loss effects, doctors re-used dinitrophenol to treat obesity in the 1980s, with 14,000 people said to have participated. The initiator of the experiment, Dr. Nicholas Barzynski, was convicted of breaking the law, and the United States subsequently issued a new ban to prevent such incidents from happening again.
But the ban has not been able to stifle people's idea of "lying thin", with the rise of bodybuilding, in order to achieve the ultimate effect that traditional training is difficult to achieve, all kinds of drugs began to penetrate into the gym.
The weight loss effect of dinitrophenol is very special, not only extremely efficient, but also almost only consumes fat, which is a big temptation for bodybuilders who need to lose fat and shape in a large dimension.
To this day, on mainstream Western video platforms, you can still easily search for various bodybuilders to publicly share their effects and feelings of using dinitrophenol fat loss.
With the rise of such social media, the sharing of these published experiences of drug bans is always tempting ignorant people who see only these fluke exceptions, but have no way of understanding the cases of those who died as a result.
From 2007 to 2018, there were 115 deaths from dinitrophenol administration in the UK, which is only a recorded number, not including cases of sudden death that have been misdiagnosed or unidentified.
Dinitrophenol has been repeatedly banned, and an important reason is that the circle is small and secretive, and at first it was only centered on the gym, and promoted through the introduction and recommendation of acquaintances. Nowadays, there are social platforms for "freedom of speech" publicity, and then there are social circles established by various fitness and weight loss websites.
More important is the terrible profits of dinitrophenol diet pills. Drug dealers buy 25 kilograms of industrial dinitrophenol from China for 350 pounds, and after packing excipients to make capsules, one can sell for 1 pound, and a whole barrel of such industrial raw materials can bring them a profit of 100,000-200,000 pounds.
The simple packaging of dinitrophenol diet pills is printed with Information of Origin in China
Even if the final outcome of these illegal drug dealers is often exposed by death cases, and they cannot escape fines and sentences in the end, there are still many people who commit crimes in the face of huge interests.
In recent years, the UK has shut down a large number of websites that illegally sell dinitrophenol, but according to media investigations, there are still many drug dealers hiding on the dark web to continue to operate their illegal activities that harm others and benefit themselves.
Dinitrophenol diet pills sold online without any captions
Under the "efforts" of drug dealers, dinitrophenol diet pills began to penetrate into the adolescent group. In recent reported deaths, the proportion of adolescents is rising, as is the proportion of women.
Unlike men in the gym, girls' needs are more common, ostensibly to be to become beautiful, but the underlying reason may be the proliferation of "body shaming" brought about by Internet social networking and the pursuit of a skinny aesthetic for certain media or idols.
Beth Sipshey took 14 doses of dinitrophenol diet pills before her death
Many adolescent victims are not really obese, but they often have emotional or psychological problems with family and friends, and the pathological pursuit of weight loss may be a way for them to seek comfort.
This is beyond the scope of physical health, if the abuse of drugs do not care about physical health, we spend more tongue science harm is futile, rather than racking their brains to eliminate dinitrophenol diet pills, it is better to think about who is making teenagers disregard health to pursue a pathological thinness.
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