Pure and Safe Personal Care: Sanitizer with Gas Chromatography

You will be selling safe hand sanitizer at advertised ethanol volumes.

Multiple controls have been instituted to guarantee you will receive sanitizer containing ethanol at advertised levels without contamination or impurities.

The Problems

The FDA issued no less than 4 warnings regarding hand sanitizer last month, several as recent as last week.  The FDA has been warning consumers about the hazards of hand sanitizer made with methanol on the market stating that it can be absorbed through the skin.  Methanol’s toxic effects in sufficient quantities causes nausea, blindness, and death among other symptoms.  NBC News reported this week that 15 adults were hospitalized and four died after consuming sanitizer with methanol.  Moreover, some products on the market, the FDA warns, have alarmingly low levels of ethyl or isopropyl alcohol making them ineffective at defending against Covid-19.

BPI Labs has heard other stories from its customers.  In a conversation with a customer last week we learned that their last manufacturer of hand sanitizer ruined their product by mixing bad ethanol with good ethanol, believing all ethanol is manufactured similarly.  Almost as recently, another customer complained that a manufacturer produced smelly hand sanitizer because they incorrectly believed that all ethanol sources have the same purity, purpose, and commercial grade.  BPI Labs has been instituting redundant safeguards against these outcomes, which include locating several reliable suppliers of cosmetic ethanol, onsite tests with gas chromatography, and purchasing a carbon filtration system.

The Solutions

BPI Labs purchased a $20,000 gas chromatography system that can indicate not only the purity and concentration of a sample of ethanol, but it will identify the presence of other impurities, such as methanol, in the sample. Since this system can reliably tell us the purity of ethanol within minutes, every shipment of ethanol to our facility will be tested before we receive it into our facility and especially before it is used or intermixed with other batches of product. Moreover, BPI Labs will source its ethanol from a single, reliable source to minimize the intermixing of differently manufactured ethanols.

Finding sources of good ethanol is a high priority for BPI Labs, and we have found several sources for ethanol in the event that a source becomes unavailable. Our primary supplier for ethanol presently triple filters ethanol to remove odors and impurities from the product. Our management team is evaluating and authorizing other suppliers of ethanol only if they filter ethanol for cosmetic use. In the event that sources of ethanol become difficult to locate, BPI Labs has also purchased an activated charcoal filter system that is designed to remove impurities from ethanol, and with our gas chromatography machine, we can certify the purity of the ethanol being used in your hand sanitizer.

Conclusion

Creating the assurance of a quality product for our customers is a top priority as we bring hand sanitizer production online. If you are looking for a new source for hand sanitizer, set up a meeting with us today to discuss how we can meet your needs.