The story

It starts with poisoned sausage. Botulism was described in Germany in the early 1800s by Justinus Kerner, who worked out that something in spoiled meat paralysed muscle and, remarkably, suggested it might one day treat conditions of too much muscle activity. The bacterium was isolated in 1895 and the protein purified by Edward Schantz in the 1940s. In the 1970s Alan Scott, a San Francisco eye surgeon, was looking for an injectable that could weaken an eye muscle instead of cutting it, and tested Schantz's toxin on crossed eyes, naming his product Oculinum. It passed to Allergan and became BOTOX, and the cosmetic use was found by accident when patients treated for eyelid spasm reported their frown lines had gone. The field then widened well past the West: Korean and Chinese makers built their own type A products, Asian practice developed masseter reduction for lower-face shaping which barely existed in Western use, and Russia produced Relatox, which was put directly against BOTOX for chronic migraine in a 209-person comparison and matched it.