UK police say 88 people who bought sodium nitrite from Canadian websites died

cbc.ca

13 points·pseudolus··6 comments

Important pieces:

> The probe is part of international inquiries sparked by the arrest of Canadian Kenneth Law, who has been charged with two counts of counselling and aiding suicide.

> [Kenneth] Law is accused of using a series of websites to market and sell sodium nitrite, a substance commonly used to cure meats that can be deadly if ingested. Police said Law is suspected of sending at least 1,200 packages to more than 40 countries.

The title is worded very weirdly.

The Canadian government seems worried about competition to their expanding assisted suicide program

Seems a bit odd for people to order this food additive all the way from Canada for use in the UK? Your local cash and carry probably stocks if.

There was also this case which might be related https://www.theguardian.com/society/2023/jan/19/stockport-ho...

I bought this online from Amazon.

It's curing salt. I use it to make corned beef.

I'm amazed how far the article twisted the situation using the passive voice and beating around the bush. I skimmed the article and for most of it I was thinking this was some sort of food safety thing. Turns out they're trying to police access to some ways people can kill themselves. There's certainly some arguments to be had about that, but the cloaked framing is utterly disingenuous.

Such bad journalism it took so long to work out if he put poison in this stuff or people were using it to poison themselves.

So it's curing salt but misuse can lead to death.

Unfortunately for this guy the UK is such a nanny state they'd probably go after him for murder if he sold a toothpick if it could take someone's eye out.

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