HCT should go into schools?, page-4

Tell them addicts are drinking and shooting up hand sanitiser to get high. quote "The ban on alcohol during the lockdown has seen addicts turning to alcohol-based hand sanitisers for a “quick fix”.

Dr Gerhard Verdoorn, from the Griffon Poison Information Centre, said there had been a surge in alcohol abuse in the country since the government instituted a nationwide lockdown and a ban on alcohol and cigarettes.

“I don’t think the government foresaw that the ban of alcohol would have such consequences,” he said. 

Desperate addicts inject the liquid directly into their veins or muscles or they drink it to get their fix, he said.

Verdoorn warned that hand sanitisers did not often contain ethanol, used in most alcoholic beverages, but rather isopropyl alcohol. When digesting isopropyl, a user could face serious intoxication, he said, with a good chance of overdosing on alcohol and suffering liver and nervous system damage.

“Isopropyl is not an alcohol that should be taken orally because it’s not a normal natural alcohol. It will definitely cause some serious liver damage and will definitely have an impact on your central nervous system.

“Even though you might get a quick fix from it and a high from it, there are definitely short, medium and long term consequences."