Parents of young children may want to think twice before purchasing liquid laundry detergent packets or pods. U.S. poison control centers are reporting a 17% increase in the number of calls involving children, especially those around the age of 2, who are most at risk of ingesting these often colorful pods. While they may look like candy, they are toxic when swallowed.
As Dr Gary Smith, lead author of a new study published in Pediatrics, explains: “Children at this age will explore their environment by putting things in their mouth. and if they simply bite down on one of these things, they’ll burst and the contents will shoot to the back of their mouths.”
Rather than risk a worst case scenario of respiratory or cardiac arrest, pulmonary edema, coma or even death as a result of being exposed to the contents of these packets, Smith says emphatically: “There is no reason why children should be rushed to hospitals in a coma or and with swelling down their lungs and we have to intubate them. There is no reason that children should have to die when we have effective safer alternatives for detergent.”
If a child becomes nausious, is vomiting, coughing or begins to choke, these could be signs of poisoning. Keep this number for the Poison Help Line handy: 800.222.1222
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