> Which is much harder to dose correctly when the kid spits or drools it out.

Never met a non autistic child who would spit or drool out calpol. I'd take the stuff myself as an adult it tastes brilliant.

> Total culture shock for me, as in Europe the default for children is rectal ingestion (which is probably a culture shock as well for Americans)

Huh are you talking about new born babies or something? I've been to a few different EU countries and you can buy liquid stuff for kids in the chemists. (Spain, france, germany, italy) source me as a child getting the stuff when I was sick abroad and the local doc sold my parents basically some off brand calpol.