Study Finds Egg In The Face Can Be Dangerous : Culture Dish

Search

Profile

Rebecca Skloot is an award-winning science writer, and a contributing editor at Popular Science magazine; she's worked as a correspondent for the NPR show RadioLab, and PBS Nova ScienceNOW. Her writing appears in The New York Times Magazine, O: The Oprah Magazine, Discover and others. She teaches in the University of Memphis's creative writing program. Her first book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, is forthcoming from Crown on February 2, 2010. It tells the story of HeLa -- the first immortal human cell line ever grown in culture (pictured in the blog's banner) -- the woman those cells came from, and the family she left behind. Click Welcome to Culture Dish for an introduction to this blog and its author.

Skloot-Related Links

Subscribe to Culture Dish

Subscribe via RSS here or get Culture Dish delivered via email by clicking here. Add to your NetworkedBlogs on Facebook here.

Permissions

All written material on the site is the copyright of the author and may not be reproduced or redistributed without permission.

« Culture Dish on the Road | Main | Famous Six Degrees of Separation Study a Fraud? »

Study Finds Egg In The Face Can Be Dangerous

Category: From the Archives • Weird Science
Posted on: January 14, 2009 1:04 PM, by Rebecca Skloot

Here's some good solid (and useful) science for you: Researchers in Liverpool have announced that "being pelted by a raw egg may result in eye injury." How they know: They studied the medical records of 18,651 patients who'd gone to an eye unit over the course of 14 months. Thirteen turned out to be egg attack victims. As the BBC reported:

"The researchers warn that egg hurling, sometimes used as a form of protest or prank, is far from harmless. They point out, in the Emergency Medical Journal, that an egg has the same dimensions as a squash ball but carries even more weight when lobbed. Jon Durnian, lead author of the paper from the Royal Liverpool University Hospital, said: "The shape and weight of an egg makes it a perfect instrument to cause quite a lot of damage it it is thrown accurately ... Mr Durnian said the public should be made aware of the damage an egg can cause and that throwing eggs should definitely not be encouraged."

Durnian has a special beef with companies who sell eggs specifically designed for lobbing, like "Mischief Eggs," which are apparently sold during Halloween. Who knew?

Now, you're probably thinking to yourself, Who throws eggs anymore? I haven't heard of anyone throwing eggs in years! Well, I must say, if I'd known about those Mischief Eggs, I may have gotten some. Because the truth is, in the last few years, I've actually thrown a few eggs:

For years apartment was directly above the entrance to the Lincoln Tunnel in Manhattan, which meant the streets below my windows turned into a huge parking lot during rush hour. Several times a week, people stuck in that traffic leaned on their horns endlessly, as if their blaring would help move cars stopped all the way to New Jersey. This does not bring out the best in people: Some people would roll down windows and shout obscenities at the honkers, others got out of their cars, puffed up their chests and actually pounded on the windows of honkers. And I -- twice in three years -- opened my window and hurled eggs at honkers. Fortunately for them, they're in cars with their eyes not pointed toward the eggs. And my aim is terrible, so I couldn't hit a person if I tried. But I can apparently hit the hood of a car.

Update: I may have also lobbed a few eggs at certain political yard signs and banners during the lead up to the last election (and the one before that).

Find more posts in: Medicine & Health Brain & Behavior