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NICKEL RASH RUMORSJohn Regitko writes: "As a follow-up to David Pickup's earlier articles on coins and health, the following is something that I wrote up some time ago for Canadian Coin News magazine." The Lighter Side by John Regitko Over a decade ago, it was reported by CBC Radio in Northern Ontario that coins were a danger to your health. Although we didn't hear of any deaths as a result of handling coins, it was reported that coins could cause a rash, sometimes rather severe, when people touched them during routine use. Interestingly, the story originally surfaced in Sudbury, Ontario, Canada's Nickel Capital and was first brought to my attention by Bill Waychison as published in the bulletin of the Timmins Coin Club. The logic or illogical argument results from the fact that nickel powder produced when nickel ores undergo a hydrometallurgical process is toxic in powder form. It is this powdered nickel that was used to produce most of Canada's coins. In solid form as in a pure nickel coin, nickel is obviously not toxic. At the time, most of our circulating coins were made of nickel plated steel. The Royal Canadian Mint issued a clarification in a press release after news reports indicated that 5 people at the Sudbury Centre Mall developed a rash, purportedly after handling coinage sent directly from the Mint. The coins involved were not rolled in materials used by the Royal Canadian Mint, indicating that the coins were not received from the Mint's distribution facilities. The Mint's press release pointed out that coins struck by the Royal Canadian Mint and their packaging do not contain any substances, agents or products that could produce a skin rash or biological reaction of any sort. The Sudbury Regional Police investigated the matter in order to determine the source of the substance. Health Canada was informed of the situation and was sent samples of the substance for analysis. Thanks. I'm sure a media search would find quite a number of articles over the years with variations on this recurring theme. When things people interact with are manufactured normally, working properly, performing as designed and harming no none, that's nothing new and not newsworthy. So any slight potential deviation is seized upon as the basis of a report. That's not a bad thing in itself - this is how we learn about and fix problems. But twisting the story to make false claims is not in the best interest of anyone but the seller of the story. -Editor To read the earlier E-Sylum articles, see:
Wayne Homren, Editor The Numismatic Bibliomania Society is a non-profit organization promoting numismatic literature. See our web site at coinbooks.org. To submit items for publication in The E-Sylum, write to the Editor at this address: whomren@gmail.com To subscribe go to: https://my.binhost.com/lists/listinfo/esylum All Rights Reserved. NBS Home Page Contact the NBS webmaster 
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