Burger King tweets 'don't drink bleach' after Trump sparks backlash by suggesting disinfectants might help treat the coronavirus

• Burger King tweeted on Friday: "not sure why we need to be the ones to tell you this, but don't drink bleach."
• President Trump sparked backlash when he rhetorically asked whether a disinfectant could be injected inside people's bodies as a potential treatment for COVID-19 on Thursday.
• Healthcare professionals and the maker of Lysol also warned people against consuming bleach.
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Burger King wants to make sure its customers know not to drink bleach amid the coronavirus pandemic.

The burger chain tweeted on Friday: "not sure why we need to be the ones to tell you this, but don't drink bleach."

President Trump rhetorically asked whether a disinfectant could be injected inside people's bodies as a potential treatment for COVID-19 on Thursday. Business Insider's Tom Porter reports that a fringe movement had already embraced bleach as a miracle cure to the coronavirus.

However, medical professionals say that Burger King is correct — bleach and disinfectant should not be used as a treatment for the coronavirus.

"Chlorine bleach and other disinfectants should never be ingested or injected into the body to treat infections such as COVID-19," according to a statement released April 24 by the American Chemistry Council. "Such a practice could be lethal or cause serious bodily harm."

"The idea that is introducing something that is a known toxin into the body, isopropyl alcohol, disinfectants — those are things that we always worry that kids swallow accidentally, or that people who are intentionally trying to hurt themselves will swallow accidentally," Dr. Esther Choo, an emergency-room doctor at Oregon Health & Science University said on MSNBC.

Stephen Hahn, the commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, also said disinfectant and bleach would not work as a coronavirus cure. However, he defended Trump in a CNN interview, saying: "I, as a doctor, would have expected to hear from someone as a natural extension of the data that were presented."

The maker of Lysol also warned people against consuming bleach.

"We must be clear that under no circumstance should our disinfectant products be administered into the human body (through injection, ingestion, or any other route)," Reckitt Benckiser, which makes Dettol, Lysol, and Harpic, said in a statement published on Friday.