Stop Setting Your Hand Sanitiser On Fire To Prove It's Flammable. It's 60% Alcohol
Testing it at home is ironically more dangerous.
By May Vin Ang — 24 Mar 2020, 12:29 PM
Malaysians are testing whether hand sanitiser is flammable in dangerous tests at home, after a warning went viral on social media
A picture showing a person suffering from severe burns on their arms has been spreading along with variations of a message reading, "Beware! Hand sanitiser contains alcohol, so it easily catches on fire."
They then tell the story of a woman's hands catching on fire as soon as she turned on a gas stove because she used hand sanitiser and did not wash her hands before cooking.
Unfortunately, the viral message that borders between truth and lie has puzzled some Malaysians
A few people are warning others about the 'dangers' of hand sanitiser by setting their own hand sanitisers alight at home, which is probably more dangerous in its own doing.
This Twitter user warned, "Be careful guys, I was shocked too," as he tried to set a drop of hand sanitiser on fire, and as expected, it caught on fire and burnt a piece of tissue paper.
"Be careful with hand sanitiser," another Facebook user said while sharing their home experiment.
Meanwhile, this video on Twitter shows a lady directly addressing the viral message, and in an attempt to prove it's true, sets her fingers on fire with hand sanitiser still wet on her hands.
To spell it out to the home experimenters: It is a well-known fact that hand sanitiser is flammable. You do not have to test it.
However, the viral message is still very much fake news.
According to Techarp, the picture of the 'cooking victim whose forearm was burnt' in the viral message is a hoax meant to scare people, as burns do not cause clean, sharp edges as seen in the photo.
Instead, the website explains that the photo is more likely a picture of a patient whose arm was harvested for skin grafts.
Also, while we know that hand sanitiser contains approximately 60% of ethyl alcohol, it still does not mean that it will burn your skin off if you use it and go near a fire source.
The US Centres of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) does warn of fire safety. However, as standard use and for all precautions, users of alcohol-based hand rubs will know they are safe by simply rubbing their hands until they are completely dry, indicating that all flammable alcohol content has evaporated.
