Medicine: Antiseptics

“Under conditions of practical use no antiseptic studied can invariably sterilize heavily infected skin. … It is improbable that a single application of any known antiseptic will sterilize a heavily infected wound.”

With such blunt negations, Justina Hamilton Hill, who for many years has studied the values of antiseptics submitted to Johns Hopkins Hospital, answered the public query of what antiseptic is best to use. Miss Hill’s full analysis appeared in last week’s American Medical Association Journal. Quieting suspicions of mercurochrome’s usefulness, she declared that a 2% tincture of mercurochrome stops the growth of germs on the human skin better than a 7% tincture of iodine.