Melatonin Overdoses Among Kids Are Up 530%, New Research Finds

In a market glutted with over-the-counter sleep aids, melatonin is one of the most popular. A naturally occurring hormone, it governs the sleep-wake cycle and is sold as a dietary supplement to help battle insomnia, jet lag and other conditions. Melatonin sales are rising fast in the U.S., from $285 million in 2016 to $820 million in 2020, according to the market research group Statista. But melatonin’s ubiquity poses dangers for kids, finds a new study published by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR). Accidental poisonings with melatonin among people 19 and under increased a staggering 530% from January 2012 to December 2021, with the biggest leaps occurring in 2020 and 2021, during the COVID-19 pandemic. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] The research, led by Dr. Karima Lelak, a pediatrician at the Children’s Hospital of Michigan, relied on reports made over the past decade to the American Association of Poison Control Centers’ National Poison Data System. During that period, the investigators found, 260,435 cases of pediatric melatonin poisoning were reported; in 2012, there were 8,337 such incidents, representing 0.6% of all reports. By 2021 the number had leapt to 52,563, representing 4.9% of the total—making melatonin the most frequently ingested substance reported to the system. Nearly 84% of all of those incidents occurred in children 5 or under, and more than 94% o...
Source: TIME: Health - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Uncategorized Drugs healthscienceclimate Source Type: news