Last weekend, Taylor Swift accidentally swallowed a bug during her Eras Tour. In the midst of singing “Tolerate It,” Swift abruptly fell into a coughing fit. She then announced that she had accidentally swallowed a bug.
Passing the incident off as “delicious,” she then faked embarrassment and asked the audience, “Is there any chance that none of you saw that?” Immediately reassuring the crowd she was fine, she said, “It’s fine, it’s all, it’s — I’ve swallowed it.”
As soon as the coughing subsided, she said, “So I’m just gonna try not to do as many of those. This is gonna happen again tonight. There’re so many bugs. There are a thousand of them. Anyway, this has been fun.”
Would swallowing bugs harm us? No, probably not. We actually ingest bugs all the time, whether we inhale them or consume them purposefully.
“Bugs are everywhere. They’re part of our lives,” said Jerome Grant, an entomology professor at the University of Tennessee. “They’re not going anywhere, and we’re not going anywhere, so we have to learn to live with them, even if it means swallowing them sometimes.”
Most bugs are totally harmless, especially the ones we inhale unnoticed. Although some people may have allergies triggered by cockroaches or moths, you would have to ingest a large amount to even be able to tell.
People with shellfish allergies are more likely to react to bugs, as lobsters, shrimp, and bugs are all members of Arthropoda, a phylum whose name translates to “jointed appendages.” But for most people, Grant says, “Just a little extra protein.”
Many sources online claim that people on average consume around 1-2 pounds of bugs per year. Grant personally distrusts these sources. As a large bug weighs only 2-3 milligrams, to reach 2 pounds of bugs, you would have to consume 800 bugs every day. He also disbelieves that we swallow bugs in our sleep.
In the end, there are so many ways that we could consume bugs, and it’s not a big deal. We should acknowledge that it happened, maybe make a joke out of it, and then just move on like Swift.
Passing the incident off as “delicious,” she then faked embarrassment and asked the audience, “Is there any chance that none of you saw that?” Immediately reassuring the crowd she was fine, she said, “It’s fine, it’s all, it’s — I’ve swallowed it.”
As soon as the coughing subsided, she said, “So I’m just gonna try not to do as many of those. This is gonna happen again tonight. There’re so many bugs. There are a thousand of them. Anyway, this has been fun.”
Would swallowing bugs harm us? No, probably not. We actually ingest bugs all the time, whether we inhale them or consume them purposefully.
“Bugs are everywhere. They’re part of our lives,” said Jerome Grant, an entomology professor at the University of Tennessee. “They’re not going anywhere, and we’re not going anywhere, so we have to learn to live with them, even if it means swallowing them sometimes.”
Most bugs are totally harmless, especially the ones we inhale unnoticed. Although some people may have allergies triggered by cockroaches or moths, you would have to ingest a large amount to even be able to tell.
People with shellfish allergies are more likely to react to bugs, as lobsters, shrimp, and bugs are all members of Arthropoda, a phylum whose name translates to “jointed appendages.” But for most people, Grant says, “Just a little extra protein.”
Many sources online claim that people on average consume around 1-2 pounds of bugs per year. Grant personally distrusts these sources. As a large bug weighs only 2-3 milligrams, to reach 2 pounds of bugs, you would have to consume 800 bugs every day. He also disbelieves that we swallow bugs in our sleep.
In the end, there are so many ways that we could consume bugs, and it’s not a big deal. We should acknowledge that it happened, maybe make a joke out of it, and then just move on like Swift.
