vuvuzela lips

By Ilse Fredericks
Education Writer

The players from the 32 participating countries won't be the only ones nursing World Cup-related injuries over the next month.

Just ask a few World Cup crazy South Africans who have been overzealously blowing their vuvuzelas, only to notice later that their lips have swollen to twice the normal size.

On social networking site Facebook, scores of users this week complained that blowing their vuvuzelas had left them looking as though they had been stung by a bee, although many said this would not dampen their gees.

"Who needs collagen ... get yourself a vuvuzela," one Facebooker said.

Pringle Bay musician Dr Bruce Copley, who has been teaching a group of Muizenberg High School pupils to make music with the vuvuzela, said quite some force was needed to blow a vuvuzela and that this could cause your lips to puff up.

"You have to buzz your lips to create the sound. While you are blowing your lips are vibrating around and inside the vuvuzela, against a solid piece of plastic.

"If you play the vuvuzela for an extended period, I suspect you will also have swollen lips."

Copley's advice was to use a bit of baby oil or Vaseline before blowing the vuvuzela, to reduce friction, and to keep something cool, like a can of cooldrink, against the lips to reduce swelling afterwards.

"People should also not forget to protect their ears when they go to the stadium," Copley added.

Dr Jantjie Taljaard, from the Division of Infectious Diseases at Tygerberg Hospital, said that as in the case of two people sharing a bottle of water, the transmission of respiratory viruses, like the common cold, was possible through sharing a vuvuzela.

He said it was also theoretically possible that someone with a common cold could, for example, transmit the virus to someone else in close proximity through blowing a vuvuzela.