It wasn’t until the 18th century that modern medicine began to take shape. Unfortunately, as medical science has progressed faster and faster in the ensuing centuries, our medical knowledge has also become more and more out-of-date. As a result, countless medical beliefs of the past now seem positively absurd.
Suppose you factor in the motivation for profit that drives so many medical and health trends. In that case, you’ll get many unsubstantiated claims from people selling food, supplements, medicine, and other stuff that’s supposed to improve your health. In addition, there are incredibly unhealthy products being advertised, such as donuts, pesticides, radiation, opioids, and amphetamines.
The following vintage health ads for such things reveal not only the general lack of knowledge about nutrition and health at the time but also the lax laws that governed what advertisers could and could not claim. As a result, companies claim in these ads that their products offer a wide range of health benefits but provide little or no evidence to support their claims.
We can see what our ancestors believed about health and medicine and how far we have progressed in understanding the health risks of exposure to certain dangers over the years. Furthermore, the ads show a shift in social attitudes towards children and less blatant sexism.
Since the ads above were created, so much has changed. Be sure to check, some strange medical practices and terrifying medical instruments from the past.
#1 Advertisement portraying vitamin-filled donuts as healthy.
#2 A 1940s advert advocating for the use of amphetamines for weight loss.
#3 Coca-Cola ad that tells readers to give their children the drink at a young age.
#4 An 1800s advertisement for stramonium cigarettes used to treat asthma. We now of course know that inhaling smoke can intensify the symptoms of asthma.
#5 Cellophane ad showing a baby wrapped in cellophane. In reality, a baby in that situation would suffocate.
#6 A 1930s ad promoting the false idea that bad skin is caused by internal toxins and can only be cured by ingesting yeast.
#7 This is one example that presents terrible advice for modern viewers, but good advice for people at the time.
While modern alkaline batteries are toxic and should not be burned, through the late 1950s, most people used zinc batteries that burned harmlessly in a fire.
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Zinc oxide fumes can and do cause lung damage.
