>To make their products more palatable, manufacturers of Jamaica ginger began to illegally replace the ginger oleoresin with cheaper ingredients like molasses, glycerin, and castor oil, cutting costs and significantly diminishing the unpleasant ginger flavor.

>When the price of castor oil increased in the latter portion of the 1920s, Harry Gross, president of Hub Products Corporation, sought an alternative additive for his Jamaica ginger formula. He discarded ethylene glycol and diethylene glycol as being too volatile, eventually selecting a mixture containing triorthocresyl phosphate (TOCP), a plasticizer used in lacquers and paint finishing.

>...

>TOCP was originally thought to be non-toxic; however, it was later determined to be a neurotoxin that causes axonal damage to the nerve cells in the nervous system of human beings, especially those located in the spinal cord.

>...

>TOCP-adulterated Jake was identified as the cause of the paralysis,[10] and the contaminated Jake was recovered. But by that time, it was too late for many victims. Some did recover full, or partial, use of their limbs. But for most, the loss was permanent.

Nothing could go wrong using a lacquer plasticizer , right?