Posted on 10/10/2022 8:24:34 PM PDT by Morgana
Two families whose teenage children died by suicide using a chemical bought on Amazon are suing the tech giant, accusing the company of knowingly selling a dangerous enabler.
Kristine Jonsson, 16, of Hilliard, Ohio, took her own life on September 30, 2020, while Ethan McCarthy, 17, of Milton, West Virginia, died by suicide on January 7, 2021.
The families are not connected, but both contracted the same Brooklyn law firm.
Both teenagers killed themselves using sodium nitrite - a chemical used to preserve foods but lethal in high doses - which they had bought on Amazon.
The drug is promoted online on suicide forums and in books. A small amount dissolved in water is fatal, and causes an excruciating death.
'Amazon is selling a product that is as deadly as cyanide,' said Carrie Goldberg and Naomi Leeds, two attorneys for the families, who filed their case on September 29 in California state court.
hey note that Amazon's online recommendations suggest that customers who purchased the chemical also buy a scale to measure the correct dose, an anti-vomiting drug and Amazon's edition of a handbook on assisted suicide.
'This is different from them selling rope, knives, or other implements that can be used for death because there is no household use for [sodium nitrite] at the level of purity (98-99%) it sells it.'
An Amazon spokesman told DailyMail.com: 'Sodium nitrite is not intended for consumption, and unfortunately, like many products, it can be misused.'
The Jonsson family said Kristine was a happy, healthy high school student and talented artist, who was 'extremely intelligent and focused'.
She lived with her parents and two younger siblings, Daniel and Katherine, and loved playing board games with the family.
But when the pandemic hit, she became withdrawn and depressed.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
“I have a better one, ban monosodium glutamate”
Not until we can get rid of that insidious dihydrogen monoxide issue.
I do not recommend you volunteer to staff the Suicide Prevention Hotline.
Oh boy. Takes 2.6 grams of sodium nitrate to be as poisonous as 200 mg of sodium cyanide.
In fact, sodium nitrite along with sodium thiosulfate is used to treat cyanide poisoning.
Excuse me.
Is not Sodium Nitrate to be found (in significant amounts) in human urine ?
Its not remotely as deadly as cyanide.
While I don’t want to be pedantic, sodium nitrite and sodium nitrate are two different things. I imagine spell checker might be causing complications. Ingesting either is a quite bad idea.
This was bound to happen. School professionals who encourage affirmation are next.
There are numerous items that you can purchase online that are lethal if ingested, in fact, there are even more such items available at any hardware or feed store. This is yet another thinly veiled First Amendment attack.
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Yes, things just get dumber and dumber. It’s the kid’s stupid. Amazon is just a huge retail store with all sorts of items that can kill you if you are stupid enough to ingest them. God gives us free will and that includes committing suicide. What a stupid story to blame Amazon.
Has anyone actually gone to Amazon and looked it up?
Maybe then they would be able to get a whiff of the BS and of families trying to sue deep pockets - no different than suing Smith and Wesson if a bad guy kills a family member and an attack by the pro nanny state.
Dihydrogen Monoxide Research Division
https://www.dhmo.org/
Thank you for pointing that out, and I'm not being sarcastic. They're entirely different chemicals.
Remember "Eleven Blue Men" by Berton Roueche? It was a case history of a group of accidental sodium nitrite poisonings that happened in New York in 1944. The piece was collected in The Medical Detectives, and the TV show "House" used quite a few cases from that book in its first two seasons.
you can’t ban tomatoes... it’s packed with umami.
(Contrary to what the lawyer in the article said, sodium cyanide (NaCN) is about twenty times more toxic than sodium nitrite, so 400x more toxic than sodium nitrate)
Sodium nitrate is "saltpeter," used in black powder recipes. It also has a reputation as a violent laxative if ingested.
(I'm a former organic chemist turned computer geek.)
Wonder why the parents didn’t see it coming never take your eyes of your teenager they are between childhood and the unknown dangerous times.
Indeed. One of the classic traps in sophomore organic courses is the nitration of benzene to nitro benzene that requires NO2+ (made from nitric acid and sulfuric acid). Students will often reach for NaNO2 since the NO2 is “right there” not realizing that nitrite is NO2-. The electrons make all the difference.
I had to look that one up. It’s getting on toward 50 years since I took organic chemistry.
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