Death By Q-Tip!
It is indeed possible. Well…death in any way is possible if you put your mind to it, but we won’t go there. Health Canada is now mulling over increasing the danger awareness of these deceptively harmless-looking cotton swabs. One of the suggestions made by Québec coroner, Dr. Jacques Ramsay, is to print a small sign with a red “X” crossing over a picture of an ear on all cotton swab package labels. That should be an obvious enough warning for the masses.
How exactly does one die from a Q-tip? Well, the act of shoving the cotton swab into your ear canal leads to a high risk of perforating your eardrum. That already sounds painful enough. However, it is the subsequent phase of the injury that will really make you cringe.
“The infection starts in the inner ear, basically millimetres away from the brain. And that’s one of the rare but possible complications that the infection could go one step further,” Dr. Ramsay explains. “If you talk to an ear, nose and throat specialist, they have tons of cases of perforated eardrums and some people with permanent hearing loss and vertigo, dizziness, symptoms like this.” (CBC.ca)
I am sure this news hit us all very hard – I know I was quite choked about it. If one of your guilty pleasures happen to be inserting a soft cotton swab into your ear and rotating it round and round till it feels squeaky clean, then you’ll know exactly what I mean. Whatever will we do now when our ear canals are itching to be pampered??
The good Dr. Ramsay recommends using our pinky fingers. There’s an idea…although it’s definitely not as satisfying (I know because I just performed a quick personal experiment) and to be honest, it looks downright uncouth if someone were to catch you in the act of rooting around your ear canal with your pinky finger – using a cotton swab is so much more refined and elegant. However, all jokes aside, it is best we heed the experts’ warning. After all, it is undeniable that avoiding death is a much better option than enjoying brief satisfaction.
Q-tips: A close look in the face of possible Death
