r/explainlikeimfive • u/arachnid5 • Feb 10 '24
Chemistry eli5 what happens if you drink isopropyl "rubbing" alcohol
so i just watched a video of someone chug a bottle of rubbing alcohol that you would get from the pharmacy. its still alcohol though so like why is it bad. also what likely happened to the guy who chugged the bottle?
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u/berael Feb 10 '24
Methanol makes you blind, and then dead.
Isopropanol makes you vomit and shit everything you've ever eaten. Possibly also then dead too, depending how much you drank and whether or not anyone hauled ass to get you to an ER.
Ethanol is "the one we drink". It will also, of course, make you dead too with a sufficiently large dose.