Bill's brilliant but unpatentable ideas, number five.
Situation: I have lots of medication to take each day. Well, several times a day in fact, and please don't make a "red pill or blue pill" joke - I've already done that over at ISFDB.
Problem: "Child-proof" containers. Ironically, the hardest pills to get at are the simple vitamins that anyone can buy without prescription. The prescription drugs are easy to get at so long as you can manage to open a small cardboard box and push a pill through a little bit of foil. Unfortunately, one of my personal problems is weakened hand use and so I am almost at the stage where I will have to give my drugs to a healthy youngster to be able to take the pill that will improve my hand functions....
Solution: REALLY "Child-proof" but "Adult-Friendly" containers. I envisage reusable bottles that open with a proper key - not too bad for those of us with weak hands, and greener than all the other types of packaging I currently have to dispose of. "Reuse is better than Recycle."
Downside: I think this has already been done - look at really old tea-caddies where the wonder-drug was kept under lock and key due to the content's high value. Even then you needed a trusted servant to keep control of the master key, you wouldn't be seen dead brewing your own tea. So maybe it's patentable now that domestic servants are more of a luxury than tea is. Oh, I was talking about drugs wasn't I? Even better then - personal doctors are even rarer than personal butlers.
Downside 2: if this is actually patentable (and I think "prior art" will probably prevent that) my new bottles will attract some sort of premium rate tax to help fix the British economy. And when we try to export them, there will be a backlash against us - a "Boston Drug-Bottle Party" maybe.
If I'm wrong and this is actually a workable idea, remember me as the creator and at least send me enough money to pay for a kid to come and open my Omega-3 bottle till the new packaging takes off.
Problem: "Child-proof" containers. Ironically, the hardest pills to get at are the simple vitamins that anyone can buy without prescription. The prescription drugs are easy to get at so long as you can manage to open a small cardboard box and push a pill through a little bit of foil. Unfortunately, one of my personal problems is weakened hand use and so I am almost at the stage where I will have to give my drugs to a healthy youngster to be able to take the pill that will improve my hand functions....
Solution: REALLY "Child-proof" but "Adult-Friendly" containers. I envisage reusable bottles that open with a proper key - not too bad for those of us with weak hands, and greener than all the other types of packaging I currently have to dispose of. "Reuse is better than Recycle."
Downside: I think this has already been done - look at really old tea-caddies where the wonder-drug was kept under lock and key due to the content's high value. Even then you needed a trusted servant to keep control of the master key, you wouldn't be seen dead brewing your own tea. So maybe it's patentable now that domestic servants are more of a luxury than tea is. Oh, I was talking about drugs wasn't I? Even better then - personal doctors are even rarer than personal butlers.
Downside 2: if this is actually patentable (and I think "prior art" will probably prevent that) my new bottles will attract some sort of premium rate tax to help fix the British economy. And when we try to export them, there will be a backlash against us - a "Boston Drug-Bottle Party" maybe.
If I'm wrong and this is actually a workable idea, remember me as the creator and at least send me enough money to pay for a kid to come and open my Omega-3 bottle till the new packaging takes off.