Having a pet tarantula could be blinding


Even though the incident happened nearly a year ago in February 2009, a Leeds man has become a worrying example of the dangers owners of tarantulas could be putting themselves in. In February last year, whilst cleaning out his tarantula’s tank, the man came under fire of the tarantula’s defense mechanism in which they release small barbed hairs from their back legs. Unfortunately, these landed in his eye causing an uncomfortable reaction, but one that went untreated for nearly a month after.

At first doctors treated the eye condition as conjunctivitis, and when this treatment didn’t succeed, a closer examination of his eye revealed numerous tiny hairs were lodged in his cornea. Currently, the man still has to apply daily eye drops and the hairs remain stuck fast in his cornea, due to them being too fine to pull out. However, he has been fortunate enough that following steroid treatment his eyesight has been fully restored, but it does serve as a warning for every tarantula owner.

Even though tarantulas are a popular household pet due to their low maintenance, they are still wild animals and will attack if they feel threatened. Following this case, many tarantula owners have taken to wearing protective glasses when handling their eight-legged pets. Whilst this case has had a fortunate outcome, the man will have to continue applying drops daily into the foreseeable future. This is due to the rarity of the case meaning that doctors have little experience to build upon and are quite unsure of how they should remove, or if they even can, the tiny hairs within the mans eye.

3rd January 2010

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