Really?

Take a look at the email I received today (below) about toddlers ingesting alcohol-based hand sanitizer, e.g. Purell.  Snopes.com has confirmed the story is true but notes there are obvious errors.  Pretty flammable toddler at 85% BAC – no open flames, please!  Kids will eat anything (except dinner) – although this seems nasty to me.  Maybe I’ll try some after lunch to see what it tastes like.

Read the other story about this on Snopes.com.  Another rocket scientist! Mom smelled it on the child’s breath and “...called poison control immediately.” Yeah – immediately after 10 minutes. Oh wait: Mom started to see some bad effects after 10 minutes, then “As the minutes passed…” things got “worse.” Then she called. Duh.  She knows the kid liked to lick her hands after she'd used the stuff, but they keep it around anyway, and apparently it's easily accessible.  Makes you wonder if Darwin was wrong after all.

Back to the original email.  I did some quick BAC calculations with an online calculator (http://www.colorado-dui.com/parts/calculate.html), and making a few assumptions this kid still had to ingest a lot more than she'd get just licking her hands:

Assumptions:
  • Child weight at 4 Years Old: 40lbs
  • Alcohol content of Sanitizer = 62%
  • Hours elapsed from ingestion to BAC testing: 6
  • BAC Result after 6 hours = .085 (assumed from “85%” which is an impossibility, and .85 would likely be deadly long before the 6 hours was up)
Results:
  • Est. amount originally consumed: 1.5 ounces
  • Est. original BAC immediately following incident (allowing 10 minutes for absorption): .17
I measured 3 squirts (per the story) and it’s hard to tell because the yield is so small, but it appears to be 1/8 of an oz. or less. That’s at least 24 squirts per oz., or:
  • Approx. 36+ squirts to yield 1.5 oz. of product
Even allowing for wild errors in my assumptions something is seriously wrong with the account given of what happened – it just doesn’t seem possible to ingest that much by licking it off your hands in anything even approaching a normal application. Of course, if someone gobbed 36 squirts of the stuff on my hands I’d be looking at ways to get it off me; if it was BBQ Sauce I’d lick it, so if I was a kid...

I think the real danger here is not from normal use, but other experimentation or abuse of the product directly from the package or dispenser. If I were the author of the story I’d be a lot more concerned with what’s going on in that classroom and skip sending emails about banning hand sanitizer. I can almost hear my dialog with the teacher...

My 4 year-old kid drank almost 2 oz of Purell in class this morning? Really? And what were you doing?

Of course, from a litigation standpoint I’m sure the school has less $$ than the manufacturer of the hand sanitizer.

Our pediatrician’s office has wall dispensers mounted out of children’s reach. Overall, probably less potential for abuse than little portable bottles or counter-standing pumps. You can get those wall-mount dispensers for $10-$15 or less (don’t ask why I know this).

Portable bottles – say – what about sunscreen? Some of that stuff smells a lot better than Purell. Observed usage methodology is not dissimilar to that of soap or hand sanitizer, which is cited as a factor for increased danger when compared to other dangerous household chemicals. I’m not looking that one up, though!

Side note: Purell and many similar products contain ethyl alcohol, the same as found in alcoholic beverages – obviously not good for toddlers but it’s not cobra venom. Some manufacturers may use isopropanol which has a higher toxicity level. Isopropanol is also found in sterilizing wipes like alcohol swabs for injection sites, etc.  So don't eat them.

Bottom line:  Don't drink the hand sanitizer, the soap, or the sunscreen.

Original Email:

Warning for all parents/grandparents Check this out on Snopes or Truth or fiction yourself to see the variations of the story but the story gets the warning out just the same for us with kids, grandkids, or just work with kids:
Yesterday, my youngest daughter, Halle who is just 4 years old, was rushed to the ER by her father for being severely lethargic and incoherent in her classroom. He was called to her school by the school secretary who said that she was 'VERY VERY SICK'!
He told me that when he arrived at her classroom, Halle was barely sitting in the chair. She couldn't hold her own head up and when he looked into her eyes, she couldn't focus them.
He immediately scooped her up and rushed her to the closest ER, and then called me. When he got there, they ran blood test after blood test and did x-rays, every test imaginable. Her white blood cell count was normal, nothing was out of the ordinary. When I arrived at the ER, the doctor there told
us that he had done everything that he could do so he was transferring her to Saint Francis Hospital for further tests.
Right as we were leaving in the ambulance, her teacher arrived at t he ER and told20us that after questioning Halle 's classmates, She had found out that our little girl had licked liquid hand sanitizer off of her hands !!!
Hand sanitizer, of all things.. But it makes sense. These days they have all kinds of different scents and flavors and when you have a curious child, they are going to put all kinds of things into their mouths. When we arrived at the Saint Francis' Hospital ER, we told the ER Doctor there
to check her blood alcohol level, and yes we did get weird looks, but they did it. The results showed her blood alcohol level was 85% -- six hours after we first took her.. There's no telling what it would have been if we would have requested it at the first ER. Since then, her school and a few surrounding schools have taken the liquid hand sanitizers out of all the lower grade classes, but what's to stop middle and high schoolers from ingesting this stuff?
After doing research on the Internet, we found out that it only takes about 3 squirts of the stuff ingested to be fatal to a toddler.
For her blood alcohol level to be so high, it would be like someone her size drinking120 proof liquor. So PLEASE PLEASE don't disregard this because we don't ever want another family to go through what ours has gone through.