West Texas Poison Center reports uptick in calls about kids ingesting hand sanitizers

EL PASO, Texas -- With schools out and families staying home, officials with the West Texas Poison Center report an uptick in calls about children getting their hands on cleaning supplies.

The poison center reports an increase in these calls of roughly 60-70%. Officials say many small children are attracted to the bright colors of some hand sanitizers, making them more likely to accidentally ingest them.

Signs of hand sanitizer poisoning include instability and drowsiness.

There are some things parents can do to prevent poisoning.

"The first strategy of course is to keep all products up and out of reach, or better yet locked away except when they're being used," said Dr. Prashant Joshi, the Assistant Medical Director of the West Texas Poison Center. "Of course that's hard to do with hand sanitizer if you want it readily available, but certainly we could put it at a height where a small child would not be able to get it."

Officials also recommend children not be left unsupervised around cleaning supplies and hand sanitizer and remind that chemicals should always be left in their original containers.