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Pharmacology B‑class

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I am surprised that this article doesn't mention that thimerosal was widely used for many years as a topical antiseptic for minor injuries. I believe it was in an alcohol/acetone solution, with an orange dye added (possibly Rhodamine?) to mark the area of application. I'll let someone more knowledgeable than I make the addition to the article, though.
--Tex (talk) 13:17, 8 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Do you mean merbromin? --Rifleman 82 (talk) 15:18, 8 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, both merbromin and thimerosal were used for this purpose. Merbromin is otherwise known as "mercurochrome". I still have an original, red Eli Lilly Merthiolate dropper bottle in my medicine cabinet, although I refilled it with a non-mercury formula in the early 2000s after Merthiolate was withdrawn from the market It was packaged in this way expressly for use as a topical antiseptic. —Quicksilver^{T @} 17:16, 26 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

It would be nice to add to the article the fact that it really, really hurt when applied to minor cuts, but I can't find any reliable sources. Grundle2600 (talk) 18:36, 3 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

"Thiomersal is very toxic by inhalation, ingestion, and in contact with skin (EC hazard symbol T+), with a danger of cumulative effects. It is also very toxic to aquatic organisms and may cause long-term adverse effects in aquatic environments (EC hazard symbol N).[8] In the body, it is metabolized or degraded to ethylmercury (C2H5Hg+) and thiosalicylate.[2]

Few studies of the toxicity of thiomersal in humans have been performed."

It seems inappropriate to say that the substance is very toxic, but also to say that few studies have been performed. I personally do not have the knowledge/information necessary to make the appropriate edit. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.228.6.170 (talk) 12:48, 1 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

There's no question that thiomersal can kill humans. It's just that we haven't done a lot of scientific studies about exactly how it kills humans (I hope the reasons for this are obvious). I added some text to try to clarify this. Eubulides (talk) 21:27, 1 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It's ethyl mercury, not just mercury. If it's going to be included in the introduction copy it must be included correctly or not included it at all.--KJRehberg (talk) 14:29, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The thiomersal molecule contains mercury atoms. You are correct that the Hg atoms are part of an ethylmercury group, but it would be incorrect to say that the ethylmercury part of the molecule accounts for 49.55% of its mass, because the HgC₂H₅ group weighs more than just the Hg atom alone.

I typed its formula, C₉H₉HgNaO₂S, into ChemDraw and the Analysis Window calculated a mass percentage for mercury of 49.55%.

See http://www.benjamin-mills.com/Wikipedia/thiomersal-analysis.png for details.

Ben (talk) 15:47, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

This incorrectly implies that the mercury in the mercury molecule is directly as poisonous in ethylmercury as it is in methylmercury, which it most certainly is not. We should all know that elements are wholly different substances when they are as part of a molecule. This is a classic junk science technique and should not be in Wikipedia. I have edited the article to remove unclear and misleading mention of free mercury as 49% of the mass of Thiomersal when it is actually part of a molecule. This misleads people into thinking they are injesting free mercury. --KJRehberg (talk) 19:40, 26 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

In chemistry, people frequently refer to elements in compounds by percentage mass. But it is not really necessary to mention it in this article, anyone who is interested can work it out.

Ben (talk) 19:51, 26 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Chemists are usually quite matter of fact about these percentages... elemental analysis is a routine method to determine the % weight of almost any element, and that number can be compared with the theoretical to determine its purity. Especially for inorganic compounds, the grades are given by percentages of the heavy metal being no less than xx.x %. See for example, http://www.alfa.com/en/GP100W.pgm?DSSTK=010471&rnd=307186247. --Rifleman 82 (talk) 20:03, 26 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I was refered to this article from mercury where thiomersal is said to be used in mascara (it appears to be in present use, first US ban 2008 in one state) but this is not mentioned in this article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 150.227.15.253 (talk) 08:24, 11 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I'm chucking the bit about "all the crazy treatments" parents use. Aside from being clearly POV, the source is a NYT article that contains a lot of "anecdotal" examples, but no verifiable facts or incidences. If you can't cite anything concrete, then settle for the MSDS.