Quality assessment of quinine sulfate samples in 19th and early 20th centuries in Portugal: the role of the Lusitanian Pharmaceutical Society
Authors:   University of Coimbra, Faculty of Pharmacy, Portugal, Guilherme Semedo Maria , Rui Pita João ,   University of Coimbra, Faculty of Pharmacy, Portugal, Pereira Ana Leonor ,   University of Coimbra, Faculty of Pharmacy, Portugal
Published: October 2024

Cinchona bark-derived medicines such as quinine sulfate were the only effective and widely used antimalarial treatments until the mid-twentieth century. The aim of this communication is to find and discuss references to quality control of quinine sulfate samples in a Portuguese pharmaceutical journal. For this purpose, we analyzed the Jornal da Sociedade Pharmaceutica Lusitana (Journal of the Lusitanian Pharmaceutical Society). This was an important Portuguese journal, edited by the Lusitanian Pharmaceutical Society, a pharmacist’s organization (1838-1933). This journal reflects Portuguese pharmacy’s evolution, and the professional and scientific issues faced by pharmacists in Portugal. We located 10 chemical analyses of quinine sulfate samples in the Jornal da Sociedade Pharmaceutica Lusitana. These were performed in 1838, 1847, 1868, 1881, 1890, 1891, 1893, 1897 and 1907 by members of the Lusitanian Pharmaceutical Society. These analyses meant to control the quality of the quinine sulfate samples, namely in terms of chemical purity. The analyses performed in 1838, 1881, 1891, 1893, 1897 and 1907 assessed samples from a single provenance. The other analyses were comparative studies between samples of different origins and were performed in 1847, 1868 and 1890. One of the samples (analyzed in 1838 and 1847) was made by a member of the Society, José Cardoso, who was a pharmacist in a Portuguese city called Mirandela. The other samples were produced by commercial companies based in different countries: France, Great Britain, Italy, Germany, and Portugal. The French samples came from the Pelletier, Delondre and Levaillant company (analyzed in 1847 and 1868); the Howards and Sons samples were British (analyzed in 1868 and 1890); a factory in Milan provided the Italian samples (1881); the German samples came from Conrad Zimmer’s company (1868), Boehringer & Söhne (1890, 1893) and Braunschweig factory (1891); and the Portuguese enterprises Sociedade Luso-Africana (1893, 1897) and Laboratorio Chimico-pharmaceutico (1907) provided the Portuguese samples. Most of the analyses were commissioned by parties external to the society. All analyzed samples were considered pure, namely according to parameters of the French and/ or Portuguese pharmacopoeias. The reports on the quinine sulfate analyses describe the tests’ results regarding the samples’ quality. In some of these analyses the authors also stress the suitability of the samples for medical or therapeutical uses in view of the results they obtained. These analyses reflect the importance attributed to chemical purity, and the problem of medicines’ adulteration and falsification. The falsification of quinine sulfate (and other medicines) was highlighted in this pharmaceutical journal, featuring methods for the detection of those falsifications, as well as reports on counterfeit medicines found in Portugal. The Lusitanian Pharmaceutical Society was therefore involved in quinine sulfate’s quality control in Portugal.