Boy who swallowed 100 magnets has surgery to remove them from his gut

A boy who swallowed up to 100 high-powered magnets purchased online has undergone major surgery to remove them.

A boy who swallowed up to 100 high-powered magnets purchased online has undergone major surgery to remove them.

After four days of stomach pain, the 13-year-old boy was admitted to Tauranga Hospital on New Zealand's North Island, where doctors discovered the magnets had joined together to form four chains inside his intestines.

Surgeons extracted the magnets and removed parts of the boy's damaged intestines, according to a report by doctors at the hospital, published Friday in the New Zealand Medical Journal.

The boy, who was not identified in the report, had swallowed “approximately 80–100 5x2mm high-power neodymium magnets” a week prior to his hospitalization, the doctors said. He was discharged after spending eight days in the hospital.

Approximately 80–100 high-powered magnets retrieved following surgery.New Zealand Medical JournalNew Zealand banned the sale of small, high-powered magnets in 2013, after the government warned that children could suffer serious injuries if they swallowed the magnets, whether out of curiosity or while playing with them as “mock jewellery.”