Repeat After Me: Do Not Drink Bleach

UPDATE, Monday, May 18: It’s still not safe to drink bleach.

In case anyone needs to hear this: That bottle of Clorox sitting under your kitchen sink is not going to cure COVID-19. Household cleaning products and disinfectants are not meant to be ingested or injected. Ever. 

Last week, according to NPR, city officials received a spike in contacts regarding fears that they may have swallowed harmful household cleaners. Fortunately no one was hospitalized or died from drinking a Lysol-tini; nevertheless the New York City Department of Health took this opportunity to remind everyone that the spray you use to clean your bathtub isn’t food or medicine. 

The Poison Control Center offers New Yorkers a sobering reminder that poison is anything that can kill you or make you sick when it makes contact with your skin, eyes or when you swallow it. That includes cleaning products.

If you happen to have ingested Windex or any other disinfectant under the pretense that it might kill coronavirus, the Poison Control Center kindly requests that you get in touch with them (212-POISONS), even if you’re awake, alert and feeling relatively fine. Don’t try to evict the glass cleaner from your body yourself by making yourself puke. 

This part should probably go without saying, but if you encounter anyone suffering from convulsions, seizures or labored breathing after ingesting cleaning products, call 911 immediately. Or you can avoid all that by not drinking bleach in the first place.