Saturday, May 14, 2011

Greenwood: Cicada lays eggs under man’s skin while meditating

The recent wave of cicadas has turned out to be more than just a curiosity for one upstate man in Greenwood, SC. Jim Furlong said he was behind his house in his rock garden meditating Friday afternoon when a female cicada inserted eggs under the skin on the back of his neck. He explained that the cicada’s activities went unnoticed as he was in a “deep, trance-like state” at the time.

Furlong said he had been meditating for roughly two hours on the day of the incident. He didn't notice anything unusual until afterwards when he began his post-meditating ritual of massaging hemp oil into the “sacred chakara [sic] regions found along a central line on the body.” It was then that he noticed a small mass under the skin on the back of his neck.

Furlong drove himself to Self Regional Healthcare that same night and was admitted at approximately 2 A.M. Saturday. According the medical report provided by Furlong, a small salmon colored sack containing insect eggs of an “unknown origin” was removed from a small incision just below his “vertebral prominens”, (the base of his neck).

The report also states the “…eggnest is of the correct color and size to be cicada eggs; however, further analysis is required.”

According to Michelle Fiana-Cornbriker, a biology professor at USC, female cicadas make a small incision in the bark of various trees or shrubs using their ovipositors. The females then insert 400 to 600 eggs into the incision, which will later turn salmon in color before hatching.

Fiana-Cornbriker said that in theory it is possible for a cicada to mistake a human for a tree or shrub if the person were to remain motionless for an extended period of time; however, she is not aware of any cases where this occurred and believes it is unlikely.

Dr. Vernon Muhamadridja, on the other hand, said in 1816 a Dr. Wigfaw Youngblood reported a case in which a cicada inserted eggs into a comatose patient at the Springdale Hospital and Asylum in Alabama. The cicada probably entered the hospital through one of the windows which were kept open during the summer months. The case was published in The American Journal of Medical Biographies and Lateral Inquiries.

According to the article, the cicada eggnest was not noticed while the patient was alive, but the cicada nymphs were found during an autopsy of the patient by medical students from a nearby university. The nymphs had, upon hatching, burrowed through the flesh of the patient and attached themselves to several skeletal structures in an attempt to mimic their normal cycle of burrowing through the ground in order to find and attach to roots for sustenance.

16 comments:

  1. This could have been accidental; if she were meditating the Cicada might not have even been aware she was laying eggs at the time. BTW who writes your headlines?

    ReplyDelete
  2. I thought it was a man meditating? Was there a woman too? Are they more attracted to males?

    ReplyDelete
  3. WTW Warren? I hope your comment was a joke, if not......wow!

    ReplyDelete
  4. We need to be serious and focus on this poor man and say a special prayer for him and his family!

    ReplyDelete
  5. That guy is my neighbor! He ended up getting a fever and is taking antibiotics now. To hell with praying for the bastard and his new age beliefs. He'll burn in hell with a thousand cicadas on him...

    ReplyDelete
  6. That son of a bith shouldn't be praying to a pagean god

    ReplyDelete
  7. that is my son you people are talking about and he is a good man, the lord is just testing him, the lord will see him through this, his fever is worse now but we have faith,

    ReplyDelete
  8. OMG... Do any of y'all know what you are talking about? Y'all are making babbling fools out of yourself! There is not one of you that could stand in front of God and him say that he is proud to be your father. His love is unconditional just like he says ours should be, we have no right to judge no on.

    ReplyDelete
  9. God is fake people, this man's meditation is more real than your "god"

    ReplyDelete
  10. ok how did this become a religious debate? seems to me the ones who dont believe in the christian God had some thing bad that happened in their life that couldnt be explained biblicaly and since the God of love and peace let such a tragic event happen than the only explaination your minds could come up with is God isnt real or at least the christian God. bad things happen to good people and good things happen to bad people...its called life so grow up and show concern for the meditating guy christian or not u can still show a little compassion..its funny the more god is left out of lives the less people seem to care for one another

    ReplyDelete
  11. Oh ok he loves u unconditionally but wouldn't say he was proud to be your father boy that makes alot of sense

    ReplyDelete
  12. this is a christian nation, we need to quite giving free healthcare to people like this meditating guy, thats what happens when you have a bunch of foreigners bringing there false idols and diseases to our country, its time for christians to stand up, the hospital should have told the guy to go see his guru, swami, or whatever he has

    ReplyDelete
  13. Again, ignorance.

    ReplyDelete
  14. I think Jesus is geting his rocks off by watching us suffer but what can u expect out of a jew

    ReplyDelete