Health officials are this morning calling for parents and guardians to keep laser pointers out of children’s reach, after it emerged that one such item caused irreversible damage to a Tasmanian teenager.
It is understood that the boy pointed the devices’s beam directly into his eyes, causing internal burns to his retinas.
The doctor who examined him has said that the teenager may have now lost up to 75% of his vision, and that the damage is likely to be permanent.
The advice given going forward is that laser pointers are not toys, and should not be given to, or handled by, minors.