Three people died and one person was permanently blinded in New Mexico after drinking hand sanitizer

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

Three people died, three are in critical condition, and one is permanently blind from methanol poisoning after drinking hand sanitizer in New Mexico, according to health officials.

The New Mexico Department of Health said the cases are related to alcoholism, adding that hand sanitizer is sometimes consumed for its high alcohol content, CNN reported.

The first case was reported to the New Mexico Poison Control and Drug Information Center on May 7, with the rest occurring after May 29, officials said.

No additional details on the victims or where the incidents happened were provided, although a doctor working at Poison Control Center said the cases stretched across two states and multiple counties, according to the New York Times.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/three-people-died-one-person-123818657.html

Let me guess, they got the idea from the QAnon website.

[tulipsandroses]

1. I doubt they got the idea from the QAnon website. It says its related alcoholism

Its unfortunately not so uncommon with alcoholics when they can't get alcohol.
As is mouthwash ,vanilla and anything else that might contain alcohol.

[PasadenaTrudy]

12. exactly.

this is fairly common in Albuquerque. Homeless alcoholics on Central swigging sanitizer and anything that contains alcohol. Very sad!

[Towlie]

2. Or maybe the idea came from here:

[Aristus]

5. There it is: The stupidest thing I've read all day.

Washing one's hands doesn't kill the virus; it gets it off your hands so you don't pass it on...

[Towlie]

7. No, soap actually does "kill" the virus.

https://en.unesco.org/news/how-soap-kills-covid-19-hands

Water alone may rinse off dirt, but viruses and bacteria are so small they often need chemical and mechanical intervention to get their sticky nanoparticles out of the crevices that make up our unique fingerprints. That’s why soap is so important. It’s made for this job. Give soap 20 seconds, at least, of thorough scrubbing and the pin-shaped molecules will penetrate the types of bacteria and viruses, including COVID-19, that protect themselves with an oily lipid membrane. Like a nail popping a tire, the water-repelling end of the soap molecule, a hydrophobic tail that can bond with oil and fats, stabs COVID-19 and leaves the virus a deflated and broken sack of RNA cells.

(I say "kill" in quotes because scientifically it's not clear that viruses are alive.)

[Aristus]

8. That's good to know.

I had been under the impression that the hydrophilic end of the soap molecule captures the virus in its watery matrix, and the hydrophobic end of the molecule makes it easy to rinse the whole mess off your hands.

[captain queeg]

3. It's referred to as surrogates

Drinking other stuff with alcohol in it when you don’t have booze. I read about 10% of Russians use surrogates. I’ve also read american teens drink hand sanitizer sometimes.

[csziggy]

14. Back in the day, Sterno was used as substitute for booze

I remember one Christmas a whole party of drunks who ran out of booze but for some reason had a case of Sterno cans (they are the little cans burned under chafing dishes used for catering). They drank them all and most of the drunks were killed. That's at least fifty years ago, long before hand sanitizer was invented.

[cwydro]

4. Very sad.

I think this has happened with people in our camp too. Let's not demonize people with this disease.

I remember the Kitty Dukakis ordeal. Horrible.

But this was way before the pandemic and QAnon.

[ProfessorGAC]

6. Alcoholism May Have Caused A Need

But, what hurt them was methanol!
Somebody (I haven't seen any admissions, other than Amazon & Walgreen's saying they did not sell this brand) brought this in from a Mexican manufacturer.
They do NOT meet either FDA or EPA registrations, because any personal care product with more than 500ppm were deregistered 25 years ago. (Or more)
The brands we all see daily contain zero methanol.
Four ounces of 75% methanol is 3 shots of something at least an order of magnitude more toxic than drinking alcohol. Horrible death, too. Organs shut down, muscles seize. Painful, helpless death.
There are, gladly, no US manufactured products with methanol.
The legal formulas use isopropanol or denatured ethanol. And the latter does not have a denaturant that is poisonous.
They use a small amount of an emetic, and a very small amount of something that is so bitter, it makes aspirin taste like a swiss chocolate bar.
So, stick with the name brands, and be sure they're made in the US.

[cwydro]

9. Lol. Stick with the name brands to drink?

Not sure of your point here.

[ProfessorGAC]

11. Use, Drink, Whatever?

I should have said for "use as directed".
Can I get sued now?

[Sympthsical]

10. Some hard core alcoholics will drink hand sanitizer

It's the nature of the disease. It has nothing to do with Q-Anon. When you're that deep into it, any alcohol will do in a pinch.

There's an Office episode, which dates back at least ten years ago, where the camera cuts quickly to Meredith licking her palm at the sanitizer station. There were a couple of episodes that deal with her alcoholism, including the world's worst attempt at an intervention.

The disease is tragic for all those affected.

[PasadenaTrudy]

13. This is true

I've seen it myself in NM. Other comments here are ignorant.