A lawsuit has been filed against Gojo Industries, the manufacturer of Purell hand sanitiser, over the supposed "misleading information" it provides about the product's effectiveness, TMZ reported on Friday.
Four individuals in Ohio, US, argue that the claims made on the front label of Purell bottles that the sanitiser "kills 99.99% of illness-causing germs" have not been proven true in reality. They also say that the pretension of helping prevent infection and disease has no scientific data to support it.
Additionally, the lawsuit refers to a letter the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) reportedly sent to Gojo in January that calls Purell hand sanitiser "nothing more than a topical antiseptic".
Hygiene products, namely hand sanitisers, have experienced an unprecedented boom in sales recently, as the new coronavirus disease has rapidly spread from China to over 180 countries.
The worldwide number of COVID-19 cases has reached 234,073 and a total of 9,840 people have died, according to the latest situation report by the World Health Organisation (WHO).