HHP Medication Safety Watch: November 2022

This list contains selected items from the full FDA list of recalls, withdrawals, and alerts for medicines and certain health products. We've provided links to FDA information for each product and its maker. Unless otherwise noted, these actions apply only to the specific brand name of the product listed. Talk to your healthcare provider before stopping or changing any medicines or treatments that they have recommended for you.

• Over-the-counter products and medicines

Over-the-counter products and medicines

Hand sanitizer contaminated with methanol (wood alcohol)

• Adam’s Polishes hand sanitizer (maker: Adam's Polishes, LLC)

Comment: After methanol (wood alcohol) was detected in this product, 20 lots of this hand sanitizer have been recalled. Drinking a product that contains methanol can cause nausea, vomiting, headache, or blurred vision. More severe toxicity includes permanent blindness, seizures, coma, brain damage, or death. In rare cases, toxicity could develop from applying contaminated hand sanitizer to the skin. Infants and young children are at particular risk of accidental poisoning by these products. People with alcohol addiction and teens are also at higher risk.

See additional FDA recalls and alerts on more than 370 hand sanitizer products in recent years due to benzene or methanol contamination, bacterial contamination, inappropriate labeling, or other problems.

Read additional issues of HHP Medication Safety Watch