Plant That Causes Serious Burns and Alters Human DNA Spreads Across New York
As if 2024 hasn’t already had enough challenges.
As if 2024 hasn’t already had enough challenges, Mother Nature has added a new one: A flowering plant that can cause serious burns and alter human DNA is spreading across New York.
It looks like an innocent flower, but it’s so dangerous it can alter human DNA.
The Giant Hogweed is one of the most dangerous invasive plants in the US — and it’s all over New York state.The hogweed is packed with sap that causes phytophotodermatitis — meaning it stops the skin’s ability to protect itself from the sun’s harmful rays. In extreme cases, exposure can result in third-degree burns and even blindness. And the effects can last months, or even years.
Even just brushing against a Hogweed is enough to cause painful pustules and skin damage. And most people who come into contact with the noxious weed, don’t even realize it until it’s too late.
This is no little dandelion or your stealthy poison ivy. The plant can grow over 10 feet, and its white flowers can be more than 2 feet in diameter.
Giant hogweed is a biennial or perennial herb in the carrot family (Apiaceae) which can grow to 14 feet or more. Its hollow, ridged stems grow 2-4 inches in diameter and have dark reddish-purple blotches. Its large compound leaves can grow up to 5 feet wide. Its white flower heads can grow up to 2 1/2 feet in diameter.
Giant Hogweed is native to the Caucasus Mountains, a mountain range at the intersection of Asia, Europe, and Central Asia. The plant may have been introduced to the United States for its seeds, which act as a spice.
Giant hogweed was likely introduced to North America as a garden “curiosity” because of its extremely large size and impressive flower but could have been introduced through spice importation, since its seeds are used in Middle Eastern cuisine. Giant hogweed occurred in North America as early as 1917.
Personally, I am not too sure about eating food containing seeds from a plant that can alter my DNA.
Damage to DNA results from the plant’s toxins interacting with ultraviolet light from the Sun. Heat worsens the effects.
Giant Hogweed sap contains toxins that cause phytophotodermatitis, which means that they heighten the skin’s sensitivity to sunlight.
The skin’s reaction to Giant Hogweed sap can be intensified by heat and sweat, which means it’s most dangerous during the summer.
But the worst damage happens at the microscopic level.
When the sap’s toxins get inside skin cells, they can destroy the body’s DNA molecules with help from the sun.
As a result, those skin cells die, which is actually what causes the blistering burns.
The first aid associated with Giant Hogweed exposures focuses on keeping the affected area out of light.
- Wash the affected area: Immediately rinse the affected skin with soap and water to remove the sap.
- Seek Shade: Move the affected individual to a shaded area to prevent further exposure to sunlight.
- Do not puncture blisters: If blisters have formed, do not puncture them. Keep the area clean and protect it with a sterile, non-stick dressing.
- Seek Medical Attention: In severe cases of skin reactions or in the presence of eye exposure, seek immediate medical attention.
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Comments
I get the sense reading this article that the situation is being misreported. It sounds to me like the plant sap neutralizes the skin’s natural defenses against UV, and everything else, including the DNA damage, is then committed by the sun.
Or at least that it’s a combination of chemical that get into the cell and photo activation of those chemicals once they’re in the cells.
This seems to be another incidence of “fear du jour.”
“The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed — and hence clamorous to be led to safety — by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.”
H.L. Mencken
Agreed…the DNA damage caused is called pyrimidine dimers. They are reversible by a group of enzymes known as photolyases (which are also activated by UV light).
Usually, they can do their job well and reverse sunburn but sometimes they cause more serious mutations that lead to skin cancer.
…sometimes *the UV* causes more serious mutations…
OMG . I want a vaccine and a prohibition of daylight travel.
Keep the sun rays 6 feet apart in the US, and 6 ft 7in in metric countries.
With seed the sowers scatter
The furrows as they go;
Poor lads, ’tis little matter
How many sorts they sow,
For only one will grow.
The charlock on the fallow
Will take the traveller’s eyes,
And gild the ploughland sallow
With flowers before it dies.
But twice ’twill not arise.
The stinging nettle only
Will still be found to stand:
The numberless, the lonely,
The thronger of the land,
The leaf that hurts the hand.
It thrives, come sun, come showers,
Blow east, blow west, it springs;
It peoples towns, and towers
About the courts of Kings,
And touch it and it stings.
A,E,Housman
I remember a similar dr who episode
Are you referring to “The Seeds Of Doom”?
That episode has my favorite TV dialog.
Tom Baker’s Doctor and his companions were being held hostage by some baddies, and he was, as usual, running his mouth. One of the baddies confronted him:
Scorby: Are you in charge here?
The Doctor: No, but I’m full of ideas.
My byline on locals.com (where my locals username is The Davidtollah and my home page is called “fatwahsforsaleorrent”) is “I’m not in charge, but I’m full of ideas.”
I was thinking Triffids
Shouldn’t Governor Hochul start a snitch line so people can report their neighbors for having these on their property? Call out the SWAT teams!! Hand out the hazmat suits!! (/sarc)
I think the “DNA damage” stuff is blown out of proportion.
The plant causes serious pain and unsightly rashes but I think that’s really the extent of it. Luckily, it’s no gympie-gympie.
I guess I would be pushing it by saying just in time for the election.
It is a shame that this plant and illegals cannot be handled in the same manner.
Long term which is worse?
I have to admit that it crossed my mind that sowing this just on the Mexican side of the US-Mexican border might have helpful effects.
Subotai Bahadur
Your labor is not in vain
though the ground underneath you is cursed and stained.
This is old news.
Finally, a use for my AR-15! Seriously, just hit it with Roundup.
Who knew that Monsanto products could save lives.
The shit works
Can we get a bunch sent to the democrats convention?
Asking for a friend.
Flower bouquets?
Corsages…
Sorry that won’t work. Vampires are never out in the sun and zombies are already covered with blisters.
Fashionable country gentlemen
Had some cultivated wild gardens
In which they innocently planted
The Giant Hogweed throughout the land
Genesis, 1971
Here’s something to ponder: giant hogweed is closely related to the carrots you buy in the grocery store.
This is an exceedingly dangerous plant that causes excruciating blistering and burning. It’s as though the devil himself decided that poison ivy wasn’t bad enough, he needed to do worse.
Ironically, the same state that is currently infested with hogweed is also the same state that is waging a jihad against the very products that make it possible to control these plants. New York is very anti-pesticide generally making irrational, politically motivated decisions that ignore rational science based risk assessments. Today, it’s neonicotinoid treated seeds used in corn and soybeans, tomorrow it will be glyphosate used in both agriculture and noxious weed control.
Stay out of the woods, folks.
Need some of that along the borders.