Doctor Highlights Dangers Of New Drinking Game
A leading eye surgeon warns that 'vodka eyeballing', a dangerous drinking game recently featured on a BBC documentary, can lead to permanent eye damage and even complete loss of sight.
The game involves pouring neat vodka onto the eyeball from the bottle in a bid to get drunk very quickly and has become popular amongst students.
Shafiq Rehman, consultant ophthalmologist at Calderdale & Huddersfield NHS Trust and Yorkshire Eye Hospital, confirms that whilst vodka cannot enter the eye in great enough amounts to affect the speed of alcohol absorption, it can indeed strip away the protective membrane covering the eye causing serious pain with catastrophic consequences for the cornea, the eye’s surface and vision itself.
The process of vodka eyeballing has featured widely on YouTube with clips of people pouring vodka into their eyes and there are a range of social networking sights where groups support the phenomenon.
In the BBC 3 documentary, Emily Atack of The Inbetweeners met with students who advocated ‘vodka eyeballing’ as a way of getting drunk.
Mr Rehman said: 'The corneal covering can be permanently damaged by pouring neat vodka which contains up to 40 per cent alcohol into the eye.
"This is exacerbated if the person then rubs the eye, causing scar tissue to develop which can then seriously affect sight.
"Obviously, I have no idea why groups of young people would want to take part in these horrendous drinking games as the pain itself associated with this particular activity would be bad enough in itself.
"People obviously don't stop to think about the potential consequences but I would urge any young person to think twice about this practice and have fun without pouring alcohol into their eyes."
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