A 1-year-old old baby boy has had a near-miraculous escape after swallowing one of the most toxic substances available; caustic soda. The baby, who could have been maimed for life, was lucky enough to be seen to just in time by doctors in Jiangsu.
On 29 December, a mother doing housework in Huai’an City of Jiangsu Province, suddenly heard her 1-year-old son crying.
She ran over and to him and was stunned. Her little boy was sitting on the floor pointing at his blackened mouth. An open, plastic bottle lay on the floor with a white powder scattered beside it.
The mother, whose name has been withheld, together with that of her baby, picked up the plastic bottle and examined it carefully. Her heart went cold; caustic soda.
Finding that the baby’s lips were blistering and black, the parents immediately took him to the local hospital for treatment. But the next day, the sores on his lips became more serious and he was then rushed to Huai’an Maternal and Child Health Care Hospital for treatment.
Zhang Yan, Chief Pediatric Surgeon at the Hospital, spoke with reporters for the Yangtze Evening News as per their report on 1 January.
“We cleaned up the wound in time. A physical examination found that the child did not have abdominal pain, abdominal distension or any other obvious digestive-tract damage”, said Zhang.
“Chosing not to do gastroscopy for the time being, we gave the child anti-infection and fluid-infusion treatments. At the same time, we closely monitored changes to the child’s condition. It was a case dealing with the problems as they came up.”
Caustic soda is the name often utilised for sodium hydroxide (NaOH) when the compound is employed as a domestic cleaner, quite often to unblock drains or toilets.
Also known as lye, the compound is popular as an industrial cleaner. Being highly alkali (pH14) and thus capable of dissolving grease, oil and fats, lye is also useful for cleaning aged kitchen equipment.
