The poison without an antidote (Part 1)

Can you imagine a deadly poison with no antidote, one that anyone could easily and cheaply buy? Can you picture a lethal poison sold by the hundreds of thousands worldwide every year? Well, such a poison existed for decades, with hundreds of thousands of units sold annually, and it wasn’t until 2007 that its sale began to be banned in some countries. This is my story of working with that hugely successful commercial product: paraquat.
 
When I started my career in the agrochemical industry at the British multinational ICI (Imperial Chemical Industries) back in 1983, I was introduced to the company’s flagship product: Gramoxone. This herbicide, with paraquat as its active ingredient, was the company’s top seller globally, including in Spain, and within its category, it reigned as the most widely sold herbicide of all. As the Advertising Manager for the company, my job was to create advertising campaigns and organize promotions to ensure this product maintained its market dominance. With an advertising budget of around 200 million pesetas (equivalent to 1.2 million euros) in 1980s terms, Gramoxone claimed the lion’s share of those funds. I used it to launch major advertising campaigns and dazzling promotional events. That’s how I became intimately familiar with this product, as did countless farmers who were its primary customers—though, in truth, you didn’t need to be a farmer to buy it.
 
Anyone could purchase it freely at garden centers, nurseries, agricultural supply stores, and even at the company’s own retail shop on Ferraz Street in Madrid—the same street where the headquarters of the Spanish Socialist Party (PSOE) is located. That store was open to the public, and all sorts of people walked in to buy. Curiously, some spent more on insecticides or fungicides for the little plants in their balcony pots than the plants themselves were worth. It would’ve been cheaper to replace the plants than to buy products to fight their pests! What’s more, the insecticides, herbicides, fungicides, fertilizers, and other items sold in that shop were designed for agricultural use, with labels listing dosages per hectare, not per flowerpot.

(To be continued…)

A well-documented exploration of Medicine, Pharmacy, and rural society in the 19th century through two biographies that should not be forgotten:
“Kisses are tears”: https://a.co/d/eCok2Y0