Digitalis folklorists and herbalists; herbalists have largely abandoned its use because of its narrow therapeutic index and the difficulty of determining the amount of active drug in herbal preparations. Once the usefulness of digitalis in regulating the human pulse was understood, it was employed for a variety of purposes, including the treatment of epilepsy and other seizure disorders, which are now considered to be inappropriate treatments. Depending on the species, the digitalis plant may contain several deadly physiological and chemically related cardiac and steroidal glycosides. Thus, the digitalis plants have earned several, more sinister, names: dead man’s bells and witch's gloves.
Radioactive contamination from the Rocky Flats Plant of substantial contamination from the 1957 plutonium fire until after the highly visible 1969 fire, when civilian monitoring teams confronted government officials with measurements made outside the plant of radioactive contamination suspected to be from the 1969 fire, which consumed hundreds of pounds of plutonium (850 kg). The 1969 fire raised public awareness of potential hazards posed by the plant and led to years of increasing citizen protests and demands for plant closure. Releases from previous years had not been reported publicly prior to the fire; airborne-become-groundborne radioactive contamination extending well beyond the Rocky Flats plant was not publicly reported