MILWAUKEE, Wis. — A four-year-old boy is spending the holidays in the hospital after a Christmas present sent him into surgery. The boy had to have part of his colon and intestines removed because he ingested parts of a popular magnetic toy, according to WTMJ.
Beck White got sick right around Christmas. His mother, Jennifer White said at first she thought her son had the flu.
“He started to vomit a very dark color. It looked like coffee grounds. At that point, I knew something was very wrong,” said White.
White and her husband rushed their son to the local hospital in Appleton before he was sent to Children’s Hospital for surgery. They say an x-ray showed Beck had swallowed the magnets inside his toy.
“He had swallowed 13 of them,” said White. “He snapped them right open and started to ingest them. And of course we had no idea.”
Once the magnet were inside him, Beck’s mom said they started to cut holes in his intestines.
“When he individually ingested them they were doing what magnets do and trying to get to each other through his intestines. And it created holes in the lining so they had to fix those,” said White.
His mom said Beck is autistic so they are usually very careful with his toys. But she says now she will not bring any toys with small magnets into their home.
“I really thought these were safe. Absolutely thought he would be OK. If I had an inkling that this would have happen I would have just got rid of them,” said White.
