Here's a question for you.

 

  1. Your friend wants to know if the insecticide DEET is bad for him. You answer:

    Is it a natural product?

    How bad are the mosquitoes?

    How much are you planning to drink?


What's a "poison?"

A "poison" is any substance capable of producing a harmful response in a biologic system.

Since you learned a moment ago that all substances are capable of producing a harmful response, we need to include the concept of dose in our notion of poison.


We often use the words RESPONSE and EFFECT synonymously.
If the response is beneficial or therapeutic, we would not call the substance a poison


Back to start of module     Previous        Next