There are three new cases of Covid-19 in New Zealand today. The number of cases has remained in single digits for 12 days. There are no further deaths.
A man was hospitalised after he drank a full pint of disinfectant after President Donald Trump suggested it as a possible treatment for Covid-19.
According to Gaylord Lopez, the director of the Georgia Poison Centre, the man was rushed to hospital after admitting he ingested about 470ml of bleach "toprevent Covid".
"He said that he took 16 ounces. I don't know very many patients who will take 16 ounces, but then again, it is a psych history patient," Lopez told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, adding that the man was taken to a psychiatric ward and later released.
The man's horrific incident comes just days after Trump discussed the theory that ingestion of disinfectants and ultraviolet light could be used as possible treatment for Covid-19.
The number of calls to a poison exposure hotline doubled after Donald Trump suggested injections of disinfectant as a possible coronavirus treatment. Photo / AP
"So, supposing we hit the body with a tremendous, whether its ultraviolet or just very powerful light, and I think you said, that hasn't been checked but you're gonna test it," Trump said during his press conference.
"And then I said, supposing it brought the light inside the body, which you can either do either through the skin or some other way, and I think you said you're gonna test that too, sounds interesting.
"And I then I see the disinfectant, where it knocks it out in one minute, and is there a way you can do something like that by injection inside, or almost a cleaning. Because you see it gets in the lungs, and it does a tremendous number on the lungs.
"So it'd be interesting to check that. So you're going to have to use medical doctors, but it sounds interesting to me, so we'll see. But the whole concept of the light, the way it goes in one minute, that's pretty powerful."
Calls to the poison control and emergency hotlines in the US spiked following Trump's discussion last week.
He soon backtracked on his comments from Thursday, telling reporters he was "asking the question sarcastically" despite being seen straight-talking to his medical advisers.
Governor of Maryland Larry Hogan, a fellow Republican, said his state had been swamped with queries.
"We had hundreds of calls in our hotline here in Maryland about people asking about injecting or ingesting these disinfectants," he told CBS on Sunday.
"Which is, you know, hard to imagine that people thought that was serious.
"But what people actually were thinking about this was, (is) this something you could do to protect yourself?"
However, when asked about whether he feels at all responsible for the spike in disinfectant-based poisoning cases, Trump said he "can't imagine why" people would be ingesting disinfectant.
