Dangers of ingesting detergent pods
INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — Detergent pods have been in the headlines multiple times lately, most notably for teens who took on the “Tide Pod” challenge to gain attention on social media.
The laundry cleaner packets could also be lethal for those who accidentally ingest them like children and seniors with dementia.
Consumer reports said there have been about 10 deaths related to detergent pod ingestion, most of which have been seniors with dementia.
The pods are filled with a long list of toxic chemicals that work well to clean dirt and grime off of clothes.
They dissolve easy in water but can also be activated with saliva or wet hands. What makes them so dangerous is that they are much more concentrated than standard detergent.
“The biggest problem we see are the people who can’t really control swallowing very well, so they’re very young and they’re very old would run the risk that the detergents would get into their lungs and that’s really where they would cause the biggest problem,” said Medical Director of Indiana Poison Center at Indiana University Health, Dr. Daniel Rusyniak.
The detergent pods have been criticized for their candy, dessert-like appearance which is what can make them desirable for young children or seniors with dementia who get confused.
“If you are a caregiver of somebody with dementia and they’re known to put things in their mouth, particularly inedible objects, this would be an indication to probably not have detergent pods in your house because there’s so concentrated. You’d be better off going back to the plain ole’ powder detergent where it would be much more difficult to ingest enough of that to cause problems,” Rusyniak said.
Consumer Reports said the chemicals inside can be strong enough to literally eat away at the tissues inside your body, make you vomit and cause your lungs to fill with fluid.
Rusyniak has advice for anyone who may accidentally ingest pods.
“The first thing is to call the poison center, we would almost always say that. Obviously, if someone is not breathing and it’s life-threatening call 911 but otherwise call the poison center. Make sure that you have the product. One of the nice things with us is that we have a large database, we can very quickly look at and tell you whether if the compounds in that product are toxic, dangerous and we can right there on the phone tell you what you need to watch for,” he said.