Dr. Jennifer Brown

They are chemicals that exist in solid form that are then aerosolized and made into a form that can be widely dispersed and sprayed.

And to do that, you usually mix them with a lot of other chemicals or you put some kind of accelerant.

You have to get it from a solid form into a gas form somehow.

Yes.

So do you cook with hot peppers ever?

Make chili, jalapeno?

Have you ever forgotten to wash your hands after you cut a pepper and accidentally touch your eyes or your nose and all of a sudden you feel this burning, itching, eye-running, snot dripping down your face sensation?

No.

Maybe.

Maybe we've all done this.

Maybe.

That is a similar type of reaction as what it would feel like to be exposed to tear gas because the chemicals, again, the broad umbrella of tear gas, are activating the same receptors, the pain receptors in your body as that chemical that's in the jalapeno, which is capsaicin.

So that's causing swelling in your throat, in your nose.

What happens when those things swell?

They shut and you can't breathe.

And you have people coughing and coughing.

These are not meant to be used in enclosed spaces.

because there will be no good air left to breathe.

So deaths have been reported.

If you are left too long in an enclosed space with tear gas, you can die.