A closer look
Drinking radioactive water was heavily promoted as a magical health tonic in the 1920s right up until an affluent socialite named Eben Byers literally drank his own jaw off; RadiThor was a popular patent medicine consisting of distilled water laced with radium isotopes, marketed as an energy-boosting cure-all for impotence and fatigue, leading Byers to consume thousands of bottles over several years and accumulate lethal amounts of radiation in his bones until his skeleton essentially disintegrated and his lower jaw had to be surgically removed to prevent further decay, serving as a spectacular historical testament to the fact that slapping a wellness label on a literal toxic hazard will easily convince wealthy people to finance their own gruesome demise in the pursuit of infinite vitality






