6 Booze Substitutes: Hand Sanitizer, Cough Syrup, and More Bizarre Alcohol-Laden Substitutes
From hand sanitizer to cough syrup to vanilla extract, see other highly alcoholic household products.
Several teenagers have been hospitalized in recent months for chugging hand sanitizer to get drunk. From cough syrup to vanilla extract, see other household products that can achieve the same effect as a few too many shots of tequila.
Forget stealing from your parents’ liquor cabinet. Kids these days have found a much easier way to get drunk— and they can do it in the school nurse’s office, too. Six teens in the Los Angeles area have been hospitalized in recent months after chugging hand sanitizer, occasionally using salt to separate the alcohol from the antimicrobial gel. Naturally, doctors are concerned it could spark a new trend and warn that ingesting the germ-killing goo—which contains 62 percent ethyl alcohol—is equivalent to taking a shot of 120-proof liquor. YouTube videos of kids chugging hand sanitizer is another sign that this sick new trend is all the rage.
Damian Dovarganes / AP Photo
Underage drinkers and alcoholics have long turned to the medicine cabinet to get a buzz, and cough syrup has often been their cocktail of choice. When consumed in large quantities, cough syrup containing Dextromethorphan (DXM) causes euphoria, slurred speech, and dizziness. Robitussin is a common brand that contains DXM, which is how the trend earned the nickname “Robo tripping.”
Scott Olson / Getty Images
Has your stomach ever burned after you accidentally swallowed mouthwash, a feeling similar to the burning sensation that comes from taking a shot of alcohol? A few swigs of Listerine, which contains 26.9 percent alcohol (roughly 50 proof) could get you sufficiently tipsy.
Procter & Gamble, PRNewsFoto / Getty Images
Kids aren’t just digging into the medicine cabinet for booze substitutes. A small bottle of Pure Lemon Extract contains 83 percent alcohol, while your average beer contains between five and 10 percent.
It’s not as potent as lemon extract, but vanilla contains at least 35 percent alcohol, which is used to extract flavor from vanilla beans. The alcohol burns off when cooked, but drinking a small bottle is equivalent to roughly three glasses of wine.
There’s a reason why this stuff is plastered with warning labels. Rubbing alcohol, or isopropyl alcohol, is completely different from the ethyl alcohol found in normal alcoholic beverages, though that hasn’t stopped people from drinking capfuls to get a good buzz going. In 1989, Kitty Dukakis, the wife of former Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis, was hospitalized after drinking a small amount of the highly flammable substance.
Craig Spurrier / Wikimedia Commons
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