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Laundry Detergent Pods Attractive To Children, Study Says

DENVER (CBS4) - Laundry detergent packets -- those small and sometimes highly colorful pods of liquid soap -- are resulting in emergency room and hospital visits for children in Colorado and nationwide.

A study published Monday in the journal Pediatrics discovered that more than 17,000 children younger than 6 ate, swallowed or were otherwise exposed to detergent in 2012 and 2013, and 769 children were hospitalized. Last year, the Rocky Mountain Poison and Drug Center took 210 calls about exposure to the detergent packets. So far in 2014, the center has received 224 calls.

Two years ago, Raniyah Avent, now 3, swallowed a packet.

"She was foaming at the mouth, couldn't breathe, couldn't move," Angela Avent, her mother, said. "She was just laying there."

 

Laundry Packets (5)
(credit: CBS)

Avent rushed her daughter to a hospital where doctors put her on life support.

"They said if I would have made it two minutes later, my baby would have passed away," she said. She has stopped using detergent pods.

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Dr. Gerald Williams cared for a 2-year-old at the Rocky Mountain Hospital for Children after the child bit into a pod. It exploded and got into her eyes. She swallowed about half and burned her throat.

"It's spongy and so she thought it was candy," he said. "She had a lot of vomiting, which is why she ended up in the ICS. She couldn't eat."

Manufacturers say the product bears clear warning labels, and they've changed the containers so kids can no longer see the colorful packets inside.

Doctors say parents should treat it like any other poison and keep it out of kids' reach.

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