I am the cousin of the wasp and the bee, I measure 35 millimeters long on average, I am not aggressive but my sting is very painful because my stinger sinks deeply, my venom is not lethal. . I am I am ? Bingo: the hornet.
If the vast majority of bites inflicted by hornets are harmless to health (in 70% of cases there is only a slight swelling of the area, accompanied by redness), sometimes the consequences can be serious: thus, this Sunday, June 18, 2017, a 43-year-old man fell into a coma after being stung by a vespa crabro, or European hornet.
Resident in Allier (03), the man suffered a serious allergic reaction after his bite: he was admitted to the intensive care unit of the Roanne hospital (Loire department) in a condition deemed “very worrying By the doctors. Concretely, the bite would have caused a sharp drop in blood pressure, which would have caused significant damage to the brain. To this day, the man is still in a coma.
A rare but serious allergic reaction
“Each year, we have one or two cases of a serious hymenoptera bite,” says Thomas Guérin, emergency manager at Roanne hospital, interviewed by our colleagues from Progress. “From the first symptoms, dial 15. And while waiting for help, the advice is to lie down, put cold on the bite, legs in the air. “
When the local swelling exceeds 10 cm in diameter and / or the symptoms (redness, pain, swelling) are still present after 12 hours, a visit to the hospital is necessary. Ditto if the sting was inflicted on the throat, mouth or eyes, or if it is a multiple sting.
Read also :
He dies after two Asian hornet bites
A nest of Asian hornets discovered for the first time in Paris
Bees, wasps … we defend ourselves naturally
