It was announced yesterday that button batteries are
dangerous once swallowed. Apparently, they cause some kind of chemical reaction
inside the skin that irritates the insides. They’ve even simulated graphic
visual displays of a battery on a giant piece of pink ham to represent skin. It’s
enough to make you squirm. But I must have missed the memo announcing that it
was OK to swallow batteries. Surely swallowing a battery is dangerous in any
situation. If parents are actually feeding their babies batteries or leaving it
to them to attempt to install batteries into their toys, we have a real problem
here. Surely these screws in these things are so tight that a child won’t even
ponder how it works until it matures to the point that it knows that it’s bad
to swallow a battery anyway? So is this the dumbing down of society saying that
we should manufacture things to be as idiot-proof as possible? Or is there a
real issue of general safety combined with dwindling resources on our hospitals
who can’t cope in emergency situations?
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