IS THAT HAND SANITIZER TOXIC?
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) of the United States has expressed grave concern over the growing risks associated with toxic hand sanitizers whose use is now prevalent because of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic.
The US FDA cited mounting cases of poisonings, blindness and even deaths, according to a report by tech authority Ars Technica.
The primary culprit is methanol — a poisonous form of alcohol that had also been blamed for deaths in the Philippines due to alcoholic products like lambanog laced with it.
Improper distilling can also produce methanol, according to experts who looked into the deaths blamed on lambanog.
But with people now turning to hand sanitizers to protect themselves from COVID-19, aside from frequent handwashing with soap and water, the danger lurks from using toxic products.
The agency has released a list of 87 products that people should refrain from using because of traces, if not big quantities of methanol, were found in them.
US FDA warns of blindness, death from methanol-laced wash gels, fluids.
The US FDA said that state health departments and poison control centers around America have been reporting a mounting tally of poisonings due to methanol-laced products.
“We remain extremely concerned about the potentially serious risks of alcohol-based hand sanitizers containing methanol,” said FDA Commissioner Stephen M. Hahn in a statement cited by Ars Technica.
“Consumers must also be vigilant about which hand sanitizers they use, and for their health and safety we urge consumers to immediately stop using all hand sanitizers on the FDA’s list of dangerous hand sanitizer products,” Hahn said.
The agency said tests showed levels of methanol ranging from 1 to 80 percent when “no amount of methanol is acceptable.”
It warned that methanol is metabolized in the body to formaldehyde and then to formic acid, causing systemic effects if ingested, inhaled or if it gains entry into the skin.
As small a volume as two tablespoons of methanol can be fatal to children who are at risk of drinking them, the agency said. It said toxic sanitizers had already blinded and killed both children and adults.
Methanol can cause vomiting, headache, seizures, blurred vision, permanent blindness, cardiac arrest and death.