More Children Than Ever Before Are Misusing Hand Sanitizer

Young children all over the country have been getting sick from a product meant to protect them. The problem is children are misusing the common germ-killer.

Have you ever paid attention to the main ingredient in hand sanitizer?

It's alcohol.

There's enough alcohol in hand sanitizer to make someone extremely drunk - to the point of alcohol poisoning - in just a few squirts of the liquid. The problem is, young kids are getting their hands on the product, and without knowing how dangerous it is, are ingesting it. According to CNN,

Since 2010, poison control center hotlines across the United States have seen a nearly 400% increase in calls related to children younger than 12 ingesting hand sanitizer, according to new analysis by the Georgia Poison Center.

 

Hand sanitizer can make children deathly ill. Even just a few squirts of the liquid can cause confusion, stumbling, and can even cause alcohol poisoning (it can also cause a child to stop breathing, in serious cases).

The best way to make sure your kids don't accidentally ingest hand sanitizer is to keep it out of their reach - only let them use it when you give it to them. It would also be a good idea to buy plain hand sanitizer (the ones that smell fruity seem to appeal to children the most).

Also be aware of your young teenagers. Some children who know better than to eat hand sanitizer have been doing it anyway in the hopes of getting drunk. These children don't realize how dangerous it is to even attempt that.

The biggest message: Just be careful - know what your children and young teenagers are doing.

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[CNN]