Recommended for you
We’re pretty confident in our avocado-handling skills at this point, being self-professed experts at prepping avocado toast, stuffed avocado, avocado margaritas (yep, you read that right), and almost every other avocado-based recipe. However, despite how often you eat the green deliciousness (or perhaps because of it!), you’ll definitely want to know about something super scary called “avocado hand.”
A potentially serious sitch, “avocado hand” is an injury becoming more common as the ingredient grows in popularity. The problem stems from accidents occurring when a knife slips while preparing avocado and (ow! ow! ow!) cuts deep into your hand. It’s not only wildly painful, but there are also tendons in your hand which can require surgery and rehabilitation to repair. Eek!
According to The Times, Simon Eccles, secretary of the British Association of Plastic, Reconstructive and Aesthetic Surgeons and former president of the plastic surgery section of the Royal Society of Medicine, explained, “People do not anticipate that the avocados they buy can be very ripe and there is minimal understanding of how to handle them.” He has a solution, though. “We don’t want to put people off the fruit but I think warning labels are an effective way of dealing with this. It needs to be recognizable. Perhaps we could have a cartoon picture of an avocado with a knife, and a big red cross going through it?” That might work.
For now, let’s just be extra careful while handling those avocados, friends.
Have you ever suffered a food-related injury? Let us know @BritandCo!
(h/t Jezebel; photos via Sean Gallup + Astrid Stawiarz/Getty)
