Most hand sanitizers contain some form of alcohol, a disinfectant; However, as any distiller will tell you, not all alcohols are created equal. Inexperienced or unscrupulous chemicals can accidentally create toxic alcohols, including one that can cause blindness.
Something like this seems to have happened during the production of a hand sanitizer, a hot product during the global pandemic. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently warned that some hand sanitizers that are labeled as containing ethanol (also known as ethyl alcohol and alcohol) have tested positive for methanol, also known as wood. According to the FDA recall listThere are 69 hand sanitizer products that they advise consumers not to use. On July 15, two more products were added to the list, both from the manufacturer. MXL Comercial SA de CV, based in Guanajuato, Mexico.
“Consumers and healthcare providers should not use hand sanitizers that contain methanol,” said FDA Commissioner Stephen M. Hahn, MD in a statement on July 2. “The FDA remains committed to working with manufacturers, compounds, state pharmacy boards, and the public to increase the safe supply of alcohol-based hand sanitizers.”
The precipitous increase in demand for hand sanitizer has a profitable business pandemic business. However, the possibility of methanol in some hand sanitizers could have some serious and sometimes deadly consequences.
“It has a number of toxic effects, nausea, vomiting, headaches, blindness, seizures and coma,” Aline Holmes, a professor of nursing at the School of Nursing at Rutgers University, told Salon. “It is especially deadly for children because even if they only touch a little bit, it could be absorbed through the skin … they put everything in their mouths, so even if they accidentally had something on their hands and put it on their hand”. mouth it could be very deadly. “
According to research published in 2017 in the Annals of Occupational and Environmental MedicineAn estimated oral dose of 3.2 to 11.9 grams of pure methanol is sufficient to cause blindness. According to reports, a lethal dose of respiratory intake is between 4,000 and 13,000 mg. “Methanol can be easily absorbed during exposure through respiration, skin, and the gastrointestinal tract,” the researchers wrote. “Even a low dose of pure methanol from oral or respiratory exposure could be fatal or cause blindness as a clinical symptom.”
Holmes explained that ingestion of methanol is very dangerous, but simply rubbing your hands and absorbing the chemical through your skin can be almost as bad.
“Even if you just put it on your skin, it can be absorbed into your skin, and the way it is metabolized in your body can lead to blindness, death or a stroke,” said Holmes.
The FDA explains in its statement that in June, the agency first warned consumers on products manufactured by Eskbiochem, which contained methanol. Since then, several of Eskbiochem’s distributors have voluntarily issued remember.
“I was surprised that there was some form of methanol, or as we call it wood alcohol, in hand sanitizers,” Dr. William Schaffner, a professor of preventive medicine at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, told Salon. “Methanol can make you very sick, with nausea, vomiting, and a headache … you can have central nervous system toxicity with seizures.”
Why would companies do this if it is so dangerous? He attributes it to ignorance or to companies trying to take advantage of this moment. The FDA commissioner believes producers are “taking advantage of the increased use of hand sanitizer during the coronavirus pandemic and putting lives at risk by selling products with unacceptable and dangerous ingredients.” The FDA also said that during the pandemic, poison control centers have had an increase in calls about accidental ingestion of hand sanitizer.
Dr. Stephen S. Morse, professor of epidemiology at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, told Salon by email that methanol has a long history of substitution when ethanol is not available.
“In an earlier time, you heard about … alcoholics who filtered alcohol from Sterno cans (used to keep food warm) because they couldn’t afford anything else,” Morse said. “As a result, many would go blind and some would die.”
Dr. Morse added: “Methanol is cheaper than ethanol and is not taxable, but for many purposes it simply cannot be substituted for other alcohols.”
Public health officials still recommend that consumers use an alcohol-based hand sanitizer that contains at least 60 percent ethanol. Especially during a pandemic, hand sanitizer is always an excellent substitute if you can’t wash your hands for 20 seconds with soap and water. The FDA said that if the hand sanitizer says it is “FDA approved,” it could be a red flag since the FDA does not approve any hand sanitizer.
In fact, as Dr. Schaffner told Salon, one way to avoid contaminated hand sanitizers is to stick to brands that are “well known.” Many people have also tried to make their own hand sanitizer, although Not everyone is in favor of DIY formulas.
