Christmas Trees Attack
Every year we spend the festive season bathed in the twinkly light of our faithful friend, the Christmas tree. But lurking among the branches are dangers you've never dared to imagine. Yes, your tree could be out to get you. Stuart M. Smith and B. James McCallum report.
We’re all well aware of the many hazards of Christmas, right? Not giving a gift, giving the wrong gift - not to mention overindulging at the office party and possibly starting a short-term relationship you didn’t intend.
Amid all this sits the humble Christmas tree. Sure, it harboured woodland creatures that may now be lurking in your house. It doubtless had a few hundred spiders, now displaced to your carpet. And certainly, the public safety videos suggest it could burst into flame at any second, leaving you homeless and destitute. This is all speculation, but what’s the chance of the tree doing you any real damage?
A sight for sore eyes
Opthalmologist David Brazier, writing in The Lancet, documented several cases of eye injuries caused by Christmas trees1. During the Christmas period of 1983, the Moorfields Eye Hospital in London saw 15 patients with Christmas tree-related eye injuries; not surprising if we consider Christmas trees for what they are - essentially sharp sticks from which we hang fragile glass and then attract children by use of coloured lights. Like moths to a flame they come.
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Leaving you breathless
Many reports of allergies to Christmas trees have emerged; even one (indirectly) to an artificial tree. Drs Anna Baverstock and Roger White, at the Frenchay Hospital in Bristol, document the case of a 44-year-old lady diagnosed with a lung disease due to her allergies to birds (bird fancier’s lung), whose symptoms resolved when she got rid of her beloved budgerigar3. Christmas, which came four weeks later, would prove to be sad, not only due to the absence of her fine feathered friend, but because, yet again, she found she couldn’t breath. The culprit this time, turned out to be her synthetic tree. Her budgie had once perched in the tree, and when she set it up the following month, traces of the bird were enough to cause her disease to flare.
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A less fortunate two-year-old Canadian suffered recurrent pneumonia from the age of ten months. X-rays revealed a persistent density in his right lung for which he ultimately underwent surgery to remove the bottom third of his lung. When the lobe was cut open, a 3 cm x 0.5 cm foreign body was found, described as "(resembling) the distal branch of an evergreen tree"5. He had inhaled a branch.
A festive menace?
Christmas trees have even attempted to kill people, albeit in self-defence. Dr Scott Davies and his colleagues report on the case of a man who suffered paralysis of one half of his diaphragm whilst trying to fell a Christmas tree with a hand saw6. The rare injury occurred due to the gentleman contorting, stretching the nerve which helps control breathing to the point of failure.
So, the beloved Christmas tree; breathtaking and capable of bringing a tear to the eye in more ways than one. Maybe it’s safer to forget the fir this year…
More festive tomfoolery:
- Duh! - Last minute gifts suck
- Yummy - Null's got Christmas all trussed up
- Fun - Retro toys make the best presents- Nutty - Quantum Santa
[1] Brazier, D.J., 'Eye Damage from Christmas trees', The Lancet, 1984, Dec, 8;2(8415):1335
[2] Kajioka, E.H. et al, 'Opthalmomyiasis in Hawaii', Hawaii Med. J., 2004, Mar, 63(3):78-9
[3] Baverstock, A.M. and White, R.J., 'A hazard of Christmas: Bird Fancier’s Lung and the Christmas tree', Respir. Med., 2000, Feb, 94(2):176
[4] Philip, J. et al, 'A Christmas tree in the larynx', Paediatr. Anaesth., 2004, Dec 14(12):1016-20.
[5] Yanchar, N.et al, 'Oh Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree…', Canadian Medical Association Journal, 2004, Dec, 171 (12).
[6] Tiede, R.H. et al, 'Unilateral phrenic nerve paralysis from cutting down a Christmas tree', South Med. J., 1994, Nov, 87(11):1161-3.
Title image: Lucía Pizarro Coma
Other images: DOYMA (larva) and Paediatric Anaesthesia (tree from lung).
Other images: DOYMA (larva) and Paediatric Anaesthesia (tree from lung).
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