Just when you thought toys couldn’t possibly get any more dangerous…
In recent years we have seen an increasing sophistication in the nature of our children’s toys.
Assuming, that is, we don’t simply give them an iPad with Minecraft on it and call it a day.
With that increased sophistication is the increasingly stringent safety regulations placed on the manufacturing of children’s toys.
Of course, getting injuries will always be a risk no matter what you do, but thanks to designing and manufacturing regulations placed on toy producers these days, parents can have a peace of mind knowing that these toys are safe for children to play with.
The problem, then, arises when injuries arise out of the toy’s usage, regardless of how safe the actual design is.
At the age of three, British boy Taylor-Jay Ravicini suffered a freak accident, where he was hit straight in the eye by a toy arrow.
As you can imagine, this was a horrendous situation for a toddler.
The eye was permanently damaged, but thanks to the hard work of the staff in an NHS hospital, the boy managed to keep the eye.
Since the accident however, he was blind in said eye.
Alas, it was not to last. Six years later, Taylor suffered yet another freak accident.
Taylor was having some fun with his friends, pelting each other with Nerf bullets.
This wasn’t initially any cause for concern – the Nerf gun series was designed from the ground up to be safe for children to use, including the bullets themselves.
The bullets are made of a spongy foam material which was originally created by the Parker Brothers in the pursuit of making a ball that was safe for indoor play.
In other words, injuries really shouldn’t be an issue.
There is just one problem – it still can cause damage if the bullet manages to hit the eye.
In Taylor’s case, the boy got incredibly unlucky – a stray Nerf bullet successfully hit Taylor in the same eye that was damaged from the freak accident all those years ago.
This caused the eye to fill up internally with blood, building pressure and creating immense amounts of pain.
Several visits to the hospital later, and soon mother and son realized that nothing they were doing was helping Taylor’s situation – pressure simply kept building back up after being relieved each time.
In a bid to save Taylor’s remaining eye and his sight, the family had to make a hard decision to remove Taylor’s bad eye.
Now, Taylor and his mother have started a fundraising campaign to get Taylor a good prosthetic eye.
This is incredibly important – not only does it help maintain a sense of normalcy, especially for a young boy, a prosthetic also prevents the growth of tissues in the eye socket from completely filling up the space.
Considering that Taylor is as of present only 9 years old, this is something that will definitely help him in the long run.
If you are interested in helping out this young boy, his GoFundMe campaign can be found here.
SEE ALSO: Popular Toy Explodes In Son’s Face – Now The Dad Wants To Warn Others