Times: Le bling-bling costs teenagers their fingers
From: Biwah (biwah_at_hotmail.com)
Date: 12/17/04
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Date: Fri, 17 Dec 2004 19:59:40 +0000
December 17, 2004
Le bling-bling costs teenagers their fingers
>From Charles Bremner and Marie Tourres in Paris
THE fashion for le bling-bling is being blamed for a surge in the number of
teenagers losing their fingers. Surgeons in France are having to carry out
amputations daily because peopleıs rings are getting caught and then tearing
off their fingers.
"The situation is serious," Thierry Dubert, a surgeon in Paris, said.
"Nowadays we are obliged to amputate one finger a day solely because of
rings getting jammed. The usual story is a young person climbing over a
fence to get a football and then the ring gets caught in the wire when he
jumps down. Itıs terrible because in that case the finger stays behind.
"The fashion among the young is making things worse," said Dr Dubert, who is
president of the European Federation of Hand Emergency Services. "The worst
of all is that they often wear them on their thumbs. The loss of a finger is
a bad enough handicap but the disruption of daily life is incomparably
greater if you lose a thumb. They should wake up to the danger."
Thumb rings have gained poularity in France, together with other trappings
of le bling-bling which have been adopted by sportsmen, rap singers and
youths from immigrant-dominated housing estates.
Dr Dubert said that ring injuries, at the base of the finger, were usually
more serious than other finger damage because this usually occurred to the
tip. In about half the cases, surgeons managed to sew the finger back, he
said.
Victims should put the digit in a sealed plastic bag and then surround it
with another bag full of ice: "The severed finger must not be frozen or wet.
Then you call an ambulance.
"I cannot think of any circumstance in which I would recommend wearing a
ring. Every ring is a potential razor and wedding rings are the worst. The
best is to wear the ring around your neck."
Surgeons tried to persuade Paris jewellers to sell rings with a tiny gap, so
that they would open and release the finger in an emergency. ³It did not
work because jewellers do not like to talk about accidents and injuries,² Dr
Dubert said.
Last week, Paolo Diogo, a Portuguese football player with the Swiss team
Servette, lost a finger while celebrating a goal; his ring caught on a fence
as he jumped down.
The Health Ministry in Canada is so worried that it has warned people not to
wear rings at work. "There is a very small space between the ring and the
finger, yet often the ring catches," the ministry said.
But no one was prepared to give up their bagues and alliances (wedding
rings) in a straw poll by The Times in the Forum des Halles shopping centre
in Paris yesterday.
Marco Cartorc, a 21-year-old shop assistant with a heavily decorated gold
ring, said that he had never heard about the danger. "I wonıt change my
ring," he said.
"It is a fashion accessory and it cost me nearly £300. I had to save up to
buy it and I'm not taking it off."
online.co.uk/newspaper/0,,174-1406272,00.html
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