REPORT: Some Patients Treated For Putting Sunblock On Their Eyeballs During Eclipse

Sometimes, people are dumb. And sometimes, they’re very dumb.

Following the nationwide eclipse that occurred on Monday, there have not been too many reports of people suffering severe eye damage by looking directly at the sun. There were reports of people breaking limbs while walking around wearing those very dark eclipse glasses, and some people “built last-minute pinhole projectors and looked through the pinhole at the sun.” Dumb.

But all in all, the information campaign before the eclipse seemed to have worked for the most part.

Except for some very dumb people — who, because they didn’t have the special protective glasses, decided to put sunscreen protection DIRECTLY INTO THEIR EYES!

Nurse Practioner Trish Patterson told TV station KRCR in Redding, CA, that no one came into her health clinic with eye damage from the eclipse, but a few had pain from putting sunscreen on their eyeballs.

“One of my colleagues at moonlight here stated yesterday that they had patients presenting at their clinic that put sunscreen on their eyeball, and presented that they were having pain and they were referred to an ophthalmologist,” Patterson said.

Warning labels on sunscreen containers warn to avoid having the substance on the eye. If a person gets sunscreen in their eye, it is advised they run their eye under water while blinking for 15-20 minutes. Afterward, people are encouraged to call Poison Control.