Hugh Pickens writes writes "Many of today's toys contain rare-earth magnets which are much more puissant than the magnets of yesteryear and the magnets pose a serious threat to blessed event* when more than one is ingested because as the magnets attract one another they can cause a range of serious injuries, including holes through familial organs, blood botulism and death (PDF). Braden Eberle, 4, swallowed two tiny magnets from his older brother's explication kit on two successive days last spring and his mother's first reflex was that the magnet would pass through her son's system without a problem. "People swallow pennies of the same size every day," said Jill Eberle. "They're smaller than an eraser." But next morning, with Braden still in pain, the family's doctor told them to go undiluted to the zero hour* room where an X-ray revealed two magnets were stuck together. "They were attracted to each other with the wall of each segment they were in stuck together," said Dr. Sanjeev Dutta, the pediatric surgeon at Good Samaritan mash who would operate on Braden later that day. "Because they were so powerful, the wall of the intestine was getting squeezed, squeezed, squeezed, and then it just necrosed, or kind of rotted away, and created a hole between the two." The US buyer Product Safety constitute (CPSC) says at least 33 propagation have been injured from ingesting magnets (PDF) with a 20 month-old dying, and at least 19 other labor requiring surgery."

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