Widespread access to the Internet has an increasing influence on how suicides are committed. On websites such as eBay® or Amazon.com®, highly toxic substances including cyanides are available for purchase. In the last 5 years, a few fatal intoxications associated with Internet shopping and buying “suicide kits” have been reported. The epidemiology of intoxications reported by the American Association of Poison Control Centers between 2000 and 2018 shows that about 10% of all exposures to cyanide were related to suicide attempts and intentional ingestion of this substance. In order to determine the cyanide concentration in four fatal intoxication cases associated with Internet shopping, a headspace gas chromatography with dual-column/dual-flame ionization detection method was validated and applied to casework. The method was linear in range, from 1 to 50 mg/L, with a coefficient of determination of 0.999 (R2). The limit of quantification was 1.0 mg/L; the detection limit was 0.5 mg/L. Intra- and interday validation precision and accuracy did not exceed 10% and 15%, respectively. Recovery and matrix effect values ranged from 94.8% to 103.8% and from −5.2% to 3.8%, respectively. The cyanide concentrations were determined in biological fluids (blood, urine, bile, vitreous humor and gastric content) and postmortem tissue samples (spleen, kidney, liver and brain). The headspace gas chromatographic method, which is routinely used in clinical and forensic toxicology to quantify ethanol with its congeners (methanol, acetone, isopropanol, n-propanol and n-butanol), can also be applied to determine the cyanide concentrations in intoxication cases. The global problem of a high number of suicides each year requires increasing and more restrictive control of highly toxic substances available online as well as careful monitoring of human exposure to cyanide. This old and well-known poison is being increasingly used nowadays for suicidal purposes; therefore, the determination of cyanide in biological samples is still important in terms of clinical and forensic toxicology.

中文翻译：

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老毒药，新问题：与网上购物有关的氰化物致命中毒


互联网的广泛使用对自杀方式的影响越来越大。在 eBay® 或 Amazon.com® 等网站上，可以购买包括氰化物在内的剧毒物质。在过去的五年里，已经报道了一些与网上购物和购买“自杀包”有关的致命中毒事件。美国中毒控制中心协会报告的 2000 年至 2018 年间中毒流行病学显示，所有氰化物暴露中约 10% 与自杀未遂和故意摄入该物质有关。为了确定四起与网购相关的致命中毒案件中的氰化物浓度，对顶空气相色谱双柱/双火焰电离检测方法进行了验证并将其应用于案例工作。该方法在 1 至 50 mg/L 范围内呈线性，确定系数为 0.999 (R2)。定量限为1.0mg/L；检出限为0.5mg/L。日内和日间验证精度和准确度分别不超过 10% 和 15%。回收率和基质效应值分别为 94.8% 至 103.8% 和 -5.2% 至 3.8%。测定生物体液（血液、尿液、胆汁、玻璃体液和胃内容物）和死后组织样本（脾、肾、肝和脑）中的氰化物浓度。顶空气相色谱法通常用于临床和法医毒理学中，用于定量乙醇及其同系物（甲醇、丙酮、异丙醇、正丙醇和正丁醇），也可用于测定中毒病例中的氰化物浓度。 每年自杀人数众多的全球性问题需要对网上提供的剧毒物质进行更多和更严格的控制，并仔细监测人类接触氰化物的情况。这种古老而众所周知的毒药现在越来越多地用于自杀目的。因此，生物样品中氰化物的测定在临床和法医毒理学方面仍然具有重要意义。