Sir, – Shops have started to make hand-sanitisers available for use by customers as they enter the premises. In rural Donegal, some shopkeepers have been making their own concoction and putting it in plastic spray bottles. I used the mixture in one shop, and when I returned to the car my wife and I took a few seconds to recognise the smell as Jeyes Fluid, which is not recommended for use on skin.
Once bitten, twice shy, so in the next shop I asked what was in the unmarked spray bottle. I was told that the main ingredient was poitín. The rationale, apparently, was that the poitín was 70 per cent alcohol and thus would kill the virus.
Of course, some people might consider this use to be very profligate. – Yours, etc,
TOMÁS
MAOILSEACHLAINN,
Lettermacaward,
Co Donegal.