From The NY Times:

Parents may want to lock the medicine cabinet as well as the cabinet under the sink. A new study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has found that more than twice as many children are accidentally poisoned with prescription or over-the-counter medicines as with household consumer products.

The researchers estimate that more than 70,000 children under 18 visit emergency rooms yearly suffering from unintentional medication overdoses, compared with about 30,000 for poisonings with other products. Most of the affected children have ingested medicines without their parents’ knowledge, but 8 percent of emergency room visits and 14 percent of hospitalizations were the result of parents accidentally overdosing their offspring. More than 75 percent of the medication overdoses were in children under 5.

Dr. Daniel S. Budnitz, the senior author and an epidemiologist with the C.D.C., said that the study did not count visits to private physicians’ offices or other health care facilities, so the numbers are probably an underestimate.

The study, published in the August issue of The American Journal of Preventive Medicine, found that the drug most commonly implicated in poisoning was acetaminophen (Tylenol and other brands), with opioid painkillers and benzodiazepine antianxiety drugs close behind.

Dr. Budnitz said that parents should of course keep medications out of the reach of children, but that packaging improvements are also important. “Child safety caps came out in the 1970s and haven’t changed much,” he said. “There are packaging improvements that can be made, and we’re working with manufacturers and other federal agencies to encourage this.

From StoptheDrugWar.org:

The Tarheel State is about to become the latest to ban salvia divinorum, the potent but fast-acting hallucinogen that has become increasingly popular among young drug experimenters in recent years. A bill that would do that, SB 138, now sits on the desk of Gov. Beverly Perdue, who is expected to sign it. Last week, the House approved the measure by a vote of 94-15. It earlier passed the Senate on a unanimous 45-0 vote.

The bill makes possession of salvia an infraction, a minor crime punishable by a maximum $25 fine. A third possession offense would be charged as a misdemeanor. The bill has no separate provisions for charging manufacturing or sales offenses.

The bill includes two exemptions. The first is for ornamental gardening; the second is for university-affiliated researchers.

North Carolina will join 14 other states and a handful of towns and cities that have banned or regulated salvia in recent years, the most recent being the resort town of Ocean City, Maryland, earlier this month. Salvia is not a prohibited controlled substance under federal law, although the DEA is evaluating whether it should be, a process that has gone on for more than five years now.

From the examiner.com:

Billy Mays was found dead in his home on June 28, 2009, a little more than one week after the Tampa, Florida pitchman had his fiftieth birthday. After returning to Tampa on a flight the night before, Billy Mays told his wife, Deborah that he wasn’t feeling well and went to bed. She found him unresponsive the next morning. Though the sudden death of Billy Mays was shocking, no one would have imagined the autopsy controversy and details that were soon to follow.

The first autopsy was expected to be performed the following day, on June 29, 2009. Though Billy Mays had been scheduled for hip surgery the following day, many wondered if a head injury suffered from a rough landing at TIA could have resulted in his death. It wasn’t long, however, that it was announced that Billy Mays died from hypertensive heart disease. In fact, the very next day, the Hillsborough County Medical Examiner went public with their findings that it wasn’t a bump on the head or head injury that caused Billy Mays’ death, but rather an undiagnosed case of hypertensive heart disease. At the time of the statement, it was announced that the final cause of death would not be made public until the full autopsy had been completed.

Dr. Vernard Adams announced the first results of hypertensive heart disease. During this conference, Dr. Adams states that Billy Mays had no history of previous drug abuse. He also mentions Billy Mays’ prescriptions for tramadol and hydrocodone, however standard toxicology testing would be performed and that the results would be returned within 8-10 weeks. It wasn’t until those toxicology reports came in that controversy ensued.

The toxicology report showed that Billy Mays had a ‘drug cocktail’ in his blood. In addition the hydrocodone and tramadol, Billy Mays also had cocaine, oxycodone, alprazolam and diazepam. It was also revealed that it was not just cocaine, but rather cocaine metabolites found in Billy Mays’ system, signifying that the cocaine had broke down in his system. Billy Mays’ wife, however, discredits the autopsy, it’s findings, or the allegations that Billy Mays’ used cocaine, as well as had a drug cocktail in his system before he died.

The autopsy showed that cause of death was heart disease and that cocaine use was a contributing factor, but now new claims from a forensic pathologist, Cyril Wecht challenges those findings. According to doctor Cyril Wecht, it was the drug cocktail that killed Billy Mays.

Dr. Cyril Wecht stated, “There are six brain-depressant drugs, including alcohol. As Jane (Jane Velez-Mitchell) has mentioned, Xanax and Valium, which are benzodiasapines (ph), anti-depressants, and then three narcotic-type drugs, Hydrocodone, Oxycodone, and Travedal (ph). And then alcohol, which many people don't appreciate, which is also a brain depressant drug.

Cumulatively, even those each of those is at a sub-toxic, sub- lethal level, when acting in concert, act to depress the respiratory system, and then can lead to cardio-respiratory arrest, cardiac arrhythmia and death.

In my opinion, the release of the finding of hypertensive and arteriosclerotic-cardiovascular (ph) disease within the day or so after the autopsy was premature. You have a 50-year-old man dying suddenly. I think you should wait until the toxicology comes in.

They did not. They just released that. Subsequently, when the report came back, they seized upon cocaine, which is also present, not one of the drugs that I mentioned. Cocaine is a stimulant. I do not believe that cocaine played a role. “