Thousands of children ingested laundry products and harmful levels of over-the-counter drugs last year, an official report says.
National Poisons Information Centre said it received 9,691 inquiries in 2015, of which the vast majority related to cases of human poisoning.
In its annual report for last year, the centre said the proportion of calls from members of the public rose from 28 per cent in 2014 to 33 per cent in 2015.
However, as in previous years, the majority of inquiries were from healthcare professionals. The remainder were from other sources such as nursing homes, schools and veterinary practices.
Accidental poisonings accounted for 82 per cent of incidents, while 15 per cent related to intentional self-poisoning or recreational abuse. Of 196 serious or unusual cases, 135 patients had a complete recovery.
More than 2,300 household products were involved in poisoning incidents. There were 344 incidents involving laundry products such as washing powders, liquid detergent products and fabric softeners. Of these, 53 per cent showed no symptoms.
Detergent capsules
There were 178 cases involving exposure to concentrated single-use liquid detergent capsules. This represented an increase of 8 per cent compared to 2014. More than half of these cases developed minor symptoms including vomiting and coughing.
More than nine out of 10 of the cases involved children aged under five. One child developed severe symptoms and required treatment in hospital.
As in previous years, paracetamol was the most common drug involved in poisoning, accounting for 17 per cent of incidents. There were 1,354 products involved in poisoning which contained the product. Of these, 56 per cent involved children under 10 years.
