Wednesday 24 April 2013

"David Cameron to look at crack-down on envelopes after nasty spate of paper cuts"

Spotted by Graeme in The Telegraph:

The Prime Minister said he would "look carefully" at how the trade in non-self adhesive envelopes still sold over the counter can be stopped.

His intervention comes after Sarah Houston, a 23-year-old who was working as an intern at the Number 10 policy unit, was found in the ladies' toilets bleeding from her tongue after trying to moisten an envelope without using the office-approved moistening pad, last week. The parents of the Leeds University student have called for an end to the "morally repugnant" practice of selling sharp-edged envelopes and more regulation.

Their case was raised in the House of Commons by Caroline Nokes, who called for the Prime Minister to stop envelopes being sold after several of her constituents reported similar injuries to their fingers and one of her researchers suffered a nasty gash at the corner of her mouth while attempting to lick an A4 envelope all the way across in one go.

She said 62 people had to attend A&E in the past year after sliding their fingers under the flaps of envelopes, which are "easily available on the high street alongside other dangerous stationery products such as staple guns".

1 comments:

Tim Almond said...

The injuries from eating the insides of a McDonalds apple pie before it's cooled, or getting brain freeze from eating ice cream too quickly are rarely taken seriously by people.

The government should create a public health campaign covering TV and interactive media (including an iPhone app/game) that helps to teach kids how to deal with this.