Burnol go? Where did all the
The household product is missing from pharmacies in Pakistan. But its brand recall still holds By Abdullah Niazi
W
alk into any pharmacy in Pakistan and ask for Burnol. The pharmacist will definitely recognise the drug but will very quickly tell you that the quick-acting, iconic, yellow antiseptic cream that has been a mainstay in kitchen cabinets and medicine boxes for decades has not been on the market for a couple of years. While Abbott Laboratories, the manufacturers of and owners of the ‘Burnol’ name in Pakistan, have not commented on the famed burn remedy being discontinued, the word from sources in the pharmaceutical industry is that the cream is not being manufactured for the past couple of years after Abbott tried and failed to relaunch the cream in back in 2016. This is in stark contrast to India - where the cream has not just been a mainstay but its ownership has switched hands at heavy prices over the decades and continues to be a sought after product. The name Burnol both in India and Pakistan has become synonymous with any remedy cream that gives quick relief from burns or cuts. It is also a product that has an entrenched stake in the subcontinent’s ‘meme’ culture. Everytime a person feels that someone they disagree with has undergone a setback or humiliation, cheekily suggesting that they
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‘apply Burnol’ is a retort that started off as childishly charming and has now been used ad nauseum.
Where did Burnol originate?
O
ne of the first mentions of ‘Burnol’ as a brand name can be found in the first volume of ‘The British Medical Journal’ from 1934. A small paragraph long section under the heading ‘Acriflavine Cream’ reads “Burnol acriflavine cream (Messrs. Boots) contains about 1 per 1,000 of acriflavine dissolved in a base of which the chief ingredient is liquid paraffin. It is intended as an antiseptic but soothing application suitable as a domestic and first-aid remedy in a wide variety of minor conditions. The valuable antiseptic properties of acriflavine are well known, and hence the cream appears to be very suitable for the uses for which it is recommended. The cream is put up in tubes.” While the formula for the cream has changed, and is now marketed under the slightly different salt name ‘Euflavine’, not much else has changed. The cream is still used as an antiseptic to treat minor cuts and burns that one might expect to get around the house. Acriflavine, the formula on which Burnol is based, has been around for a while. Originally introduced as a reddish-brown antiseptic powder in 1912 by the German medical-re-
search worker Paul Ehrlich, it was used extensively in World War I to kill the parasites that cause sleeping sickness. The topical cream took off quite well after its successful use in the great war. A volume of The British Medical Journal’ from 1917 points towards pharmaceutical companies fast adapting towards using the formula, which is how it was first turned from a powder into a cream. “Boots has several forms of Acriflavine, one of them as an emulsified cream for the first-aid treatment of wounds, abrasions, and burns. Reckitt and Sons Ltd meanwhile presented a new germicide called Dettol,” reads the journal. Boots, of course, would go on to mass produce Acriflavine under the brand name ‘Burnol’ and find great success in India, where a marketing campaign targeting women working in the kitchen sick of minor burns would prove to be wildly successful. It is, however, a curious coincidence that Reckitt and its new product Dettol would be mentioned in the same breath as the Acriflavine that Boots was producing - particularly because eventually in post-partition India Reckitt would end up buying Burnol. And they would not be the only ones.
Enter India
I
ndia was one of the first markets where Burnol actively found a receptive audience. Most Indian women that worked in kitchens were constantly facing
