9/10 "girl drink" drinkers can't tell soap from soda

Alcopop, what have you wrought?

"A household cleaning product that researchers say looks and smells like a soft drink has been the cause of more than 100 accidental ingestions, according to a study published in the journal Pediatrics in August and presented Sunday at a conference of the American College of Emergency Physicians.

From Jan. 1 to April 20, researchers found 104 records in the Texas Poison Center database of human ingestion of Fabuloso, manufactured by Colgate-Palmolive. Of these, 94 were unintentional and 2 were occupational exposures. The rest were either related to self-harm or not characterized as to cause. None caused serious harm.

Fabuloso is sold in purple, blue, yellow and green varieties, and packaged in one-liter, transparent plastic bottles that resemble soft drink containers.

The study’s authors say the most common reason for ingestion appeared to have been mistaking the product for a drink. More than 40 percent of the calls to the poison center involved ingestion by people over 12.

Three-quarters of those 20 or older who drank it accidentally were women; of those under 6 who drank it, three-quarters were boys. The authors write that Fabuloso “is a minor gastrointestinal irritant and unlikely to cause any major morbidity or mortality.”

The different colors have varying odors, all of them pleasantly fruity. “It doesn’t taste terrible,” said Dr. Marc E. Levsky, a co-author of the study and an assistant program director in the department of emergency medicine at the Carl R. Darnall Army Medical Center in Fort Hood, Tex. “It’s a detergent solution, and it tastes like soap.”[NYT]"

*The headline is a joke, the data presented herein are not mean to support the headline, which is independently truthy.

Comments

[aeroman]

General rule: If a hastily-packaged pomegranate version hasn't been revealed yet, it's not a sweet drink.

[The J Train]

My wife uses the purple kind on our hardwood. I've come closer to making this mistake than I'd like to admit.

[DUDACKATTACK!!!]

Yet again, life imitates art:

http://snltranscripts.jt.org/75/75ishimmer.phtml

[1984 Was Not a Shopping List]

Yet again yet again, life imitates satire:

Homer (drinking): "mmm... lemon..."
Marge: "Homer, that's dishwashing liquid!"
Homer: "Yeah, but whattaya gonna do?"

[RBL]

Hmmmm, who to blame for this one?

The company, for making such an attractively-packaged product?

Or Texans, for being so gawdawful stupid?

[ballgame]

During the Vietnam war, forcing prisoners (detainees?) to drink detergent was a form of torture the South Vietnamese government would inflict on suspected Viet Cong sympathizers (according to A Vietcong Memoir: An Inside Account of the Vietnam War and Its Aftermath). The consequent intestinal damage was supposedly permanent (though exactly how was not explained).

FWIW.

[TRex]

Hey, I love that stuff!

For my floors, I mean. The lavender scent smells just like a field of fresh lavender. It's awesome.

Damn, that makes me want to go mop.

Thing is, this stuff has been available in Mexico for decades and they're not drinking it and keeling over. Americans. Pfffffffft.

[pseudonymous in nc]

Thing is, this stuff has been available in Mexico for decades and they're not drinking it and keeling over. Americans. Pfffffffft.

But Mexicans like their soda in glass bottles, no? These do look like an off-brand version of gatorade, especially the lemon variety.

[Njorl]

"*The headline is a joke, the data presented herein are not mean to support the headline, which is independently truthy. "

I think it is very mean of the data to support the headline like that.

[Elayne Riggs]

Seems to me this is a clear-cut case in favor of trademark protection. The soft-drink makers ought to be able to sue Colgate-Palmolive for appropriating a trademark for a product which so resembled theirs that there's a ton of evidential proof that consumers mistook one for the other.