Here's What Happens When A Child Swallows A Button Battery

If you're a parent or take care of a child, you'll likely spend most of your day stopping said kid from putting stuff in their mouth all day. Some of it is relatively harmless, but in the case of small things, you're looking at a choking hazard.

When it comes to tiny button batteries though, you don't just have to worry about a choking hazard, but the battery's corrosive effects.

The website CPR Kids reported on the horrifying effects that a button battery can have on a little one's insides.

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The founder, Sarah Hunstead, went public with a time-lapse experiment that showed what a lithium button battery can do to chicken fillets.

Speaking to Kidspot, Sarah said: "I was inspired to do this particular experiment after a trip to the supermarket with my oldest daughter".

She went on: "We were walking down the baby products aisle - she stopped and picked up a small object off the shelf where the baby toys were - my daughter said 'MUM! LOOK! a button battery! That is so dangerous!"

That prompted her to want to show just what a battery can do when swallowed. To show the corrosive effects, she placed a battery inside a chicken fillet for a total of four hours and kept an eye on the damage done during that period.

The first image is taken at the 10-minute mark, the second at 30 minutes, and the third after four hours, when the fillet is quite clearly burned by the battery.

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According to Sarah, the same would happen to the inside of a child's stomach.

She said: "Even though I have seen first hand the damage that a button battery can do, I was still shocked at the immediacy of the burns."

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According to The Battery Controlled, when a coin-sized lithium button battery gets stuck in a child's throat, the saliva triggers an electrical current.

This then causes a chemical reaction that can severely burn the oesophagus in as little as two hours.

Kids under the age of four are at the biggest risk, but all children of any age should be taken to A&E immediately if you suspect they've swallowed a battery.

To be safe, keep all objects containing small batteries out of your kids' reach.

Topics: Children, Life News, Kids, Real

Marianne Eloise

Marianne writes about TV, film and internet culture for Nylon, VICE, The Guardian, Vulture, Time Out and more. She was previously a staff writer at Dazed.