Due to the coronavirus pandemic, disinfectants have become a massive part of everyone's lives to guarantee safety around the house.
But, it seems like because of the COVID-19 threat, poison centers across the United States have seen a spike in calls related to disinfectants and cleaners.
A Spike in Poisoning and Exposure Due to COVID-19?
According to a report by Fox News, poison centers in the U.S. reported a 20% increase in disinfectant-related calls at the beginning of March this year. Still, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) did note that there is no "definite link" between the COVID-19 cleaning efforts and the reported exposures.
Nevertheless, the time the calls got more frequent coincides with the time health agencies began issuing their advisories.
"The timing of these reported exposures correspond to increased media coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic, reports of consumer shortages of cleaning and disinfectant products, and the beginning of some local and state stay-at-home orders," CDC wrote.
Additionally, the CDC believes that the data could be potentially underestimating the total cases of poisoning and exposure related to cleaners and disinfectants as the data only represents cases that called poison centers.
Cases of Exposure and Poisoning
There were a couple of cases that were highlighted in the report.
One was a woman who heard on the news that groceries should be cleaned before consuming them, so what she did was fill her sink with a bunch of products, including vinegar, a 10% bleach solution, and then hot water.
While the victim was cleaning her groceries, she reported smelling a strong "chlorine" smell in her kitchen.
That was when she started having difficulty breathing, and she was wheezing and coughing, so she called 911, who transported her to an emergency department (E.D.).
The woman was noted to have suffered from end-expiratory wheezing and mild hypoxemia and was put on bronchodilators and oxygen, plus she underwent a chest radiograph that did not show anything remarkable, so he was discharged just a few hours after the incident.
Meanwhile, another case that was highlighted was that of a preschool-aged child.
According to the CDC, the young girl was found unresponsive at home and was transported to the E.D., where she vomited during transport and was poorly unresponsive.
Physicians saw that her alcohol level was elevated at 273 mg/dL when the limit for most states is 80 mg/dL.
According to her family, the young girl ingested an unknown-amount of ethanol-based hand sanitizer that was found beside her, and that she fell and hit her head, but thankfully neuroimaging did not indicate any traumatic injuries.
The young girl was admitted to a pediatric intensive care unit for a night, where she improved and was discharged after 48 hours.
Clean Homes Safely
The CDC continues to encourage cleaning and disinfecting around the house to avoid COVID-19. Still, they also encourage doing it safely by following label directions, wearing protective gear, and storing chemicals out of reach of young children.
Additionally, the agency reminds everyone to use these chemicals in a well-ventilated area and never to mix chemicals to avoid such accidents.
As of writing, the U.S. has a total of 786,556 confirmed coronavirus cases with 42,201 deaths and 71,770 recoveries.
