Question: what makes alkalis dangerous

Matthew Lee answered on 22 Jun 2017:

What makes them dangerous is the fact that they are so far away from being a normal pH. Normal being water at a pH of 7. The further you get away from that the stronger the substance becomes and so the more it can do. Alkalis work similarly to acids, and in terms of humans they are dangerous because they denature proteins. Denaturing proteins means they destroy proteins. This is important as the walls of cells are made of proteins so an alkali will be able to destroy all of the cells in the body really easily. So if you get it on your skin it will start working ts way through your skin!