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On Fri, 09 Sep 2005 15:32:30 -0700, LurfysMa wrote:
>I guess the question I should have asked is this:
>
>What's the worst that can happen from freezing a small area of normal
>skin for 10-30 seconds with a Q-tip soaked in LN2?
>
>I used to live in an area (Rockies) that got very cold in the winter
>(up to -30 once in awhile). A lot of people got minor frostbite
>including me. I never had a serious problem, but then it was minor. It
>just seemed to me that this would be even less dangerous. It's a much
>lower temperature (-300F or so), but it's for a very short time and on
>a very small area.
>
>So, that's my question: what's the worst that can happen?
Well, think of it as a third-degree (full-thickness) skin burn.
Over most of the body, it's a pretty safe rule that any full-
thickness skin injury less than a centimeter across at its
widest will heal in without interventions such as skin grafting
or 'plasty. If you're not suffering from any conditions that
intrinsically screw up skin healing, or the cold-induced injury
isn't over particularly tight corner, secondary intention healing
(scarring) should take care of the repair work.
The reason for all the labels, by the way, is that product
manufacturers are trying to defensively mitigate the flood
of lawsuits uttered as a result of a tort law system that's
gone completely berserk over the past fifty years. I sug-
gest Peter Huber's *Liability: The Legal Revolution and
Its Consequences* (1990) as a very good appreciation
of the origins and effects of this insanity.
---------------
"The human race divides politically into those who want people
to be controlled and those who have no such desire. The former
are idealists acting from highest motives for the greatest good of
the greatest number. The latter are surly curmudgeons, suspicious
and lacking in altruism. But they are more comfortable neighbors
than the other sort."
-- Robert A. Heinlein
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