Children Are Consuming Hand Sanitizer. Hereâs How to Keep Them Safe. During the pandemic, there was a dramatic increase in exposures to hand sanitizer reported among kids under 6, U.S. poison center data shows. Credit...Getty Images Feb. 25, 2021 Alcohol-based hand sanitizer became a must-have item during the pandemic. But as sales jumped and families stocked up, poison control centers started getting more calls about little children who had accidentally ingested it. Even now, about a year after the frenzy to stock up on sanitizer first began, hand sanitizer remains within easy reach in many homes, and calls to the nationâs poison control centers are on pace to continue trending higher than before the pandemic.