Covid-19 related products accounted for nine per cent of all dangerous non-food items detected within 2020 by the EU Early Warning System.

Inappropriate masks and disinfectants that contain toxic chemicals – such as methanol – were identified by the EU Commission which published its annual report this week.

“The Safety Gate system has proven to be resilient to crises: it helped protect consumers by providing a key tool for the effective and rapid circulation of information on dangerous products. such as unsafe masks or toxic disinfectants, and to withdraw these products from the market,” Justice Commissioner Didier Renders said.

Specifically, there were 161 mask warnings, three special uniform warnings, 13 hand sanitizer warnings and 18 warnings for UV lamps that are supposed to act as sterilizers.

According to the report, toys are the product category for which most notifications were submitted (27 per cent of total notifications), followed by product categories motor vehicles (21 per cent) and electrical appliances and equipment (10 per cent).

As for Cyprus, it made 84 notifications for dangerous products which accounted for 3.7 per cent of all such warnings. These notifications mainly concerned toys, children’s clothing, electrical appliances and cosmetics.