# People eating Tide pods **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [December 5, 2013, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-eating-tide-pods/675541 "2013-12-05T01:52:51Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Yllaria](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yllaria/32/3452_2.png) [@Yllaria](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yllaria)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-eating-tide-pods/675541/41 "2013-12-05T23:01:30Z")
Excuse me, but when you post an MSDS, I have to think it through. Well, the Ethoxylated polyethylene polyamine and the alchoholc (ethoxylated, sulfated, neutrolyzed have about a 5 g/kg LD50 (that’s the dose at which half of the test animals died - there will be a different number for rats than for mice, for example). So if you’re 150 lbs, you would be 331 kg, which means you’d have to eat 1650 grams or 3.6 pounds for half of you to die (assuming you’re a room full of lab animals). You’d have to eat twice as much alcohols (sulfated, neutrolized). Same with the ethoxylated alcohols (and I don’t know why they give that one in mg rather than g). So unless there’s a synergistic action between them, the 3.6 pounds is a conservative number to use, especially since they’re not telling you how much is inert filler. According to their website, the pods weigh 0.89 oz apiece. So you’d have to eat 64 of them to be smack in the middle of the theoretical danger zone. And there’s only 57 of them in a container. That’s going to act as something of a safety net. Of course, if you’re only 20 pounds, it only takes a bit more than 8 of them to have a 50% chance to take you out. Or rather, 8 of them if they were nothing but their active ingredients, which they’re not. And if you were a rat, assuming they used rats, which I assume you’re not. Where was I? Oh, yes. Eating pods is bad. They have numbers to prove it. Don’t do it. ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Whisperer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cat_whisperer/32/4839_2.png) [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-eating-tide-pods/675541/42 "2013-12-05T23:41:37Z")
> [@Tamerlane](#): > > They’re thinking “it fits in my mouth, therefore it must be food.” I’ve never met a discriminating dog ;). “You can food anything if you just eat it.” ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-eating-tide-pods/675541/43 "2013-12-05T23:46:49Z")
What exact advantage to detergent pods offer over powders & liquids, anyway? ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-eating-tide-pods/675541/44 "2013-12-05T23:51:05Z")
> [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](#): > > What exact advantage to detergent pods offer over powders & liquids, anyway? Marketing! They’re a new and exciting form factor, so people will buy them out of curiosity. Sales increase, at least for a little while. Whether they _stay_ increased depends on whether they actually work better. ---
**Author:** ![Canadjun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/76d3ee/32.png) [@Canadjun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Canadjun)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2013, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-eating-tide-pods/675541/45 "2013-12-05T23:51:22Z")
> [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](#): > > What exact advantage to detergent pods offer over powders & liquids, anyway? They make less of a mess if you are a klutz. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-eating-tide-pods/675541/46 "2013-12-06T00:19:48Z")
Hell, I know someone - a former Doper, in fact - who once drank a lava lamp (It did not stay down long). Granted, there was considerable alcohol in his system at the time, but people do weird, stupid, dumb stuff all the time. I am not at all surprised to hear of people eating soap “pods”. ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-eating-tide-pods/675541/47 "2013-12-06T00:27:11Z")
Pods are also more portable if you have to travel any distance to do your wash - elsewhere in an apartment building, to a laundromat, etc. They’re also easy to give to others to use, which sadly contributed to the [death of a 7-month-old](http://consumerist.com/2013/08/15/7-month-old-boy-dies-after-eating-a-laundry-detergent-pod/) whose mother, staying in a shelter, had been given some so she could do laundry. She put them in a basket next to where her infant was sleeping and stepped away for a short time. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Scoobysnax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c4cdca/32.png) [@Scoobysnax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scoobysnax)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-eating-tide-pods/675541/48 "2013-12-06T01:04:37Z")
> [@Yllaria](#): > > Excuse me, but when you post an MSDS, I have to think it through. Well, the Ethoxylated polyethylene polyamine and the alchoholc (ethoxylated, sulfated, neutrolyzed have about a 5 g/kg LD50 (that’s the dose at which half of the test animals died - there will be a different number for rats than for mice, for example). So if you’re 150 lbs, you would be 331 kg, which means you’d have to eat 1650 grams or 3.6 pounds for half of you to die (assuming you’re a room full of lab animals). > > You’d have to eat twice as much alcohols (sulfated, neutrolized). Same with the ethoxylated alcohols (and I don’t know why they give that one in mg rather than g). So unless there’s a synergistic action between them, the 3.6 pounds is a conservative number to use, especially since they’re not telling you how much is inert filler. > > According to their website, the pods weigh 0.89 oz apiece. So you’d have to eat 64 of them to be smack in the middle of the theoretical danger zone. And there’s only 57 of them in a container. That’s going to act as something of a safety net. > > Of course, if you’re only 20 pounds, it only takes a bit more than 8 of them to have a 50% chance to take you out. Or rather, 8 of them if they were nothing but their active ingredients, which they’re not. And if you were a rat, assuming they used rats, which I assume you’re not. > > Where was I? Oh, yes. Eating pods is bad. They have numbers to prove it. Don’t do it. A kg is approximately 2.2 lb. So a 150 lb person would weigh ~68 kg not 331 kg. therefore, the LD50 is 340 grams or 3/4 of a lb. ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 1:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-eating-tide-pods/675541/49 "2013-12-06T01:45:25Z")
> [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](#): > > What exact advantage to detergent pods offer over powders & liquids, anyway? > [@Sunspace](#): > > Marketing! > > They’re a new and exciting form factor, so people will buy them out of curiosity. Sales increase, at least for a little while. Whether they _stay_ increased depends on whether they actually work better. > [@Canadjun](#): > > They make less of a mess if you are a klutz. Are they, in fact, more effective? ---
**Author:** ![Yllaria](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yllaria/32/3452_2.png) [@Yllaria](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yllaria)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 1:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-eating-tide-pods/675541/50 "2013-12-06T01:54:31Z")
Damn. Got it backwards. Also, damn, that would be 1.6 ounces for a 20 pound child. That’s less than one and a half pods. Even assuming there’s inert filler, that’s solidly in the danger zone with the first pod. Not to mention that a toddler could choke on the plastic envelope. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-eating-tide-pods/675541/51 "2013-12-06T02:04:02Z")
> [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](#): > > What exact advantage to detergent pods offer over powders & liquids, anyway? When we travel we often stay in a timeshare with a washer and dryer - something like a pod packs really easy. Liquids don’t - you have to pack them in your luggage (no carryon) and they are heavy. Powders are sort of a mess to deal with out of a ziploc bag. I’d imagine for a laundrymat they have similar benefits, the deal being that they are expensive compared to regular detergent. And people using laundrymats are often getting their detergent from the dollar store. ---
**Author:** ![Marion\_Wormer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d07c76/32.png) [@Marion\_Wormer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marion_Wormer)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 3:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-eating-tide-pods/675541/52 "2013-12-06T03:35:27Z")
I just want to comment that the danger of the pods is not always death (which is horrible enough) but that if swallowed can damage the tissues of the mouth and throat causing permanent damage. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-eating-tide-pods/675541/53 "2013-12-06T03:44:01Z")
> [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](#): > > Are they, in fact, more effective? I haven’t used the Tide ones, but I discover that they are less effective, generally speaking. But then, at home, I use a homemade mix of washing soda, borax and naptha. ---
**Author:** ![grude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47774/32.png) [@grude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/grude)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 3:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-eating-tide-pods/675541/54 "2013-12-06T03:58:09Z")
> [@Dangerosa](#): > > I haven’t used the Tide ones, but I discover that they are less effective, generally speaking. But then, at home, I use a homemade mix of washing soda, borax and naptha. You put lighter fluid in your washing machine? Could that be a problem with the dryer? ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 4:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-eating-tide-pods/675541/55 "2013-12-06T04:16:10Z")
> [@grude](#): > > You put lighter fluid in your washing machine? Could that be a problem with the dryer? WAG: [Fels-Naptha soap](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fels-Naptha). ---
**Author:** ![grude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47774/32.png) [@grude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/grude)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 4:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-eating-tide-pods/675541/56 "2013-12-06T04:40:23Z")
> [@Ferret\_Herder](#): > > WAG: [Fels-Naptha soap](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fels-Naptha). Hah I guess I should have googled thanks. Just for the record I imagined this: > **[Naphtha](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naphtha)** > > Naphtha (/ˈnæfθə/, recorded as less common or nonstandard in all dictionaries: /ˈnæpθə/) is a flammable liquid hydrocarbon mixture. Generally, it is a fraction of crude oil, but it can also be produced from natural-gas condensates, petroleum distillates, and the fractional distillation of coal tar and peat. In some industries and regions, the name naphtha refers to crude oil or refined petroleum products such as kerosene or diesel fuel. > Naphtha is also known as Shellite in Australia. > The word ... ---
**Author:** ![Seanette](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/seanette/32/9139_2.png) [@Seanette](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Seanette)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 5:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-eating-tide-pods/675541/57 "2013-12-06T05:07:24Z")
> [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](#): > > What exact advantage to detergent pods offer over powders & liquids, anyway? For me, easier to use when wrists and elbows hurt enough that lifting a bottle of liquid or a box of powdered is highly unpleasant. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 6:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-eating-tide-pods/675541/58 "2013-12-06T06:38:40Z")
> [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](#): > > What exact advantage to detergent pods offer over powders & liquids, anyway? It’s a laundry detergent and a dessert topping. ---
**Author:** ![aceplace57](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aceplace57/32/3500_2.png) [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 9:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-eating-tide-pods/675541/59 "2013-12-06T09:29:32Z")
All Free and Clear comes in a clear pac and the soap is clear. Looks like a clear ice cube. Hope no one uses it for that! > **[A Mom's Take](https://www.amomstake.com)** > > A resource site for moms with easy recipes, kids activities, holiday ideas, travel inspiration and more! ---
**Author:** ![PunditLisa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/4af34b/32.png) [@PunditLisa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PunditLisa)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2013, 11:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-eating-tide-pods/675541/60 "2013-12-06T11:20:59Z")
I like the Tide Pods because there is no mess, and they are convenient. No measuring and spilling, no having to clean out the receptacle where you put the detergent. As far as cleaning clothes, I don’t think there’s any difference. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-eating-tide-pods/675541.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-eating-tide-pods/675541.md?page=4)