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- Doctors were swamped by false alarms from worried sun-watchers
who gazed at last week's eclipse, it was revealed yesterday.
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- Only a handful of people across the UK suffered eye damage
but thousands more contacted medical experts with bizarre fears that they
had been adversely affected.
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- One frantic Glasgow woman insisted her face had been
turned yellow by the eclipse, only to be told a long-standing liver problem
was the culprit.
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- Another Glasgow hospital was visited by an overseas tourist
in a panic because she had not been exposed to the "Scottish sun"
before and thought it might be particularly harmful.
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- Scotland was actually one of the least likely places
in Britain for eye damage.
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- The country experienced only a partial eclipse compared
to the south-west of England and much of the sky was obscured by cloud.
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- Just 14 cases have been confirmed - all in England -
which shows that public health warnings were heeded by most UK eclipse
viewers.
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- But several thousand people rang helplines or attended
special eclipse clinics after the event.
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- The number of eye damage cases reported by hospitals
was lower than had been widely anticipated, the British Medical Journal
revealed yesterday.
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- Jonathan Dowler, of Moorfields Eye Hospital in London,
said: "We are quite pleased that the number of people suffering damage
to their eyes is relatively low so far.
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- "It shows the campaign and health education messages
worked and did reach the vast majority of people."
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- BMJ researchers know of six confirmed cases at Moorfields,
five at Birmingham Eye Hospital and three at Derbyshire Royal Infirmary's
eye unit.
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- There is one suspected case at Bristol Eye Hospital.
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- Most resulted from staring at the sun with the naked
eye.
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- In one of the more serious cases, the patient had reportedly
looked at the sun for about 20 minutes without protection.
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- The August 11 eclipse occurred at the height of summer
with the sun near its zenith.
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- Doctors believe it was fortunate there was widespread
cloud cover on the day, which might have helped keep casualties down.
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- However, eclipse helplines were flooded, with Moorfields
receiving 1600 calls and another 600 between Birmingham and Bristol.
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- At Moorfields, 220 people turned up at the accident and
emergency department while 64 patients went to special clinics set up by
Birmingham Eye Hospital.
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- Ellen Drummond, spokeswoman for Glasgow's Gartnavel Hospital,
said: "We did get a lot of people coming in with concerns regarding
the eclipse which, how could I put it, were not exactly justifiable.
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- "Our staff were amused by some of the stories but
in a way it was a good thing. It showed the warnings did work."
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