VIRGINIA – Thanks to awareness, and some manufacturer safety measures put into place, fewer children appear to be ingesting laundry detergent pods, according to a recent study.
But while there have been declines in exposure, the research shows it’s still a significant problem in the United States for all ages. U.S. poison control centers still receive one call every 44 minutes about a young child who’s been harmed through exposure to a liquid laundry detergent pod, researchers report.
Dr. Christopher Gaw with Nationwide Children’s is the senior author of a study that researched detergent pod-related calls into U.S. poison control centers, between January 2014 and December 2022. The findings were published recently in the journal Clinical Toxicology.
While researchers say there have been declines in the number, rate and severity of exposures among children younger than six — the most recent three years of the study found more than 36-thousand calls related to these exposures.
“It usually ends up in their mouths. And oftentimes if they bite down on it or it dissolves, that’s how the detergent gets released,” Gaw said.
Researchers also found increases in exposure among older children, noting dangerous social media challenges, and among older adults with cognitive impairments like Alzheimer’s who may have mistaken the pods for food.
To keep those who are most vulnerable safe from accidental exposure or ingestion Gaw said to store detergents out of reach of little hands and in their original containers.
“There’s opportunity from an industry and policy perspective to really strengthen and shore up these product safety standards,” Gaw said.