A Taiwanese woman got an unbelievable shock after a doctor discovered four tiny bees living in one of her eyes. The 28-year-old patient, known as Ms. He, said she felt stinging pain in one of her eyes after a gust of wind blew what she assumed was dirt into her face. "It was a very intense stinging pain and I was constantly shedding tears, there was a lot of secretion," Ms. He said at a news conference. She went to Dr. Hung Chi-ting to get it checked out. When he took a closer look, he noticed what appeared to be an insect leg poking out of the corner of her eye. Carefully, with the aid of a microscope, he removed the insect — and found three more behind it. "After I pulled them out one by one, I discovered that surprisingly there were four bees," Hung said. "The size of every single bee was around 0.3 to 0.4 centimeters (.15 to .19 inches)." Every single one was alive, feasting on the salt in the woman's tears. Hung said Ms. He was very fortunate she didn't rub her eyes despite the pain she must have been in. Had she agitated the bees, Hung said, they could have secreted venom, which might have blinded her. Instead, he said, the bees were successfully removed and her symptoms quickly started to clear up. As for the bees, they're still alive and were sent to an organization to be studied. RELATED STORIES<doc-sep>Prince William slams BBC after report on methods used to secure Diana interview The wait is over, you can finally see this adorable panda cub Viral 'Charlie bit my finger' video to be taken down. Here's why See the highlights from the 2021 Billboard Music Awards See the bees living in this woman's eye Doctors found four sweat bees in a woman's eye after she visited a relative's gravesite in Taiwan. (CNN) — Doctors treating a Taiwanese woman for a swollen eye were shocked to find four tiny bees living under her left eyelid. The miniscule insects, known as sweat bees, are 3 to 4 millimeters (0.12-0.16 inches) in length, according to CNN affiliate CTS. “I saw something that looked like insect legs, so I pulled them out under a microscope slowly, and one at a time without damaging things inside,” Hung Chi-ting, the head of the ophthalmology department at Taiwan’s Fooyin University Hospital, told reporters at a news conference. Sweat bees, also known as halictidae, “nest near graves and in fallen trees, so it’s easy to come across them while hiking in mountains,” Hung explained. According to CTS, the woman, identified by her family name of He, said she thinks the insects blew into her eye at a relative’s grave site when she visited it with her family. She washed her eyes with water but kept experiencing severe pain. “It was very painful. Tears wouldn’t stop coming out of my eye,” she said. “I was scared to death.” After three hours of agony, He visited the hospital, where doctors determined she was suffering from cellulitis, a bacterial skin infection, and severe corneal erosion caused by the sweat bees. “Thankfully she came to the hospital early, otherwise I might have had to take her eyeball out to save her life,” Hung said. He’s eyesight had been reduced to under 0.1, the equivalent of 20-200 vision on the Snellen eye chart measuring visual acuity, Hung told reporters. “Luckily, she didn’t have a high fever and it hadn’t affected her central nervous system.” The sweat bee feeds off nectar and pollen, but is also drawn to human perspiration, which provides “precious moisture and salts,” according to the Missouri Department of Conservation. Local media reported that He was expected to make a full recovery.<doc-sep>While there are more than 1,000 species of sweat bees in the United States, Canada and Central America, according to Terminix, they are almost painless and sting only when they are provoked. On the Schmidt Sting Pain Index, a scale of relative agony caused by sawflies, wasps, bees and ants, the sweat bee comes in at the lowest level of pain. Described by the index as “light, ephemeral, almost fruity,” the puny sting is compared to “a tiny spark [that] has singed a single hair on your arm.”<doc-sep>
A young woman in Taiwan reportedly had four bees living beneath her eyelid and "feasting on her tears." That's according to the Guardian, which cited a press conference where a doctor at Taiwan's Fooyin University Hospital described how he found the insects squirming within the woman's eye. "I saw something that looked like insect legs, so I pulled them out under a microscope slowly, and one at a time without damaging things inside," said Hung Chi-ting, the hospital's head of ophthalmology, at the conference, per CNN. The four insects measured less than a quarter of an inch in length, the network reported, and are known as "sweat bees" or Halictidae. The insects, which are typically non-aggressive, are drawn to human perspiration that "offers them precious moisture and salts," the Missouri Department of Conservation notes. Taiwan's CTS News reported that the woman, identified by her last name, He, said she felt a pain in her eye one day while tending the grave of a relative, according to reports. She was pulling weeds at the time and presumed it was soil, but a stinging sensation under her eyelid continued even after she washed it out with water. When she visited the doctor, Hung peered into her eye through a microscope expecting to find an infection. Instead he saw the tiny legs of the bees wriggling in her ducts, the Guardian reported. What saved the woman, her doctor said: She refrained from rubbing her eyes, which could have ruptured the bees and caused an infection. "Thankfully she came to the hospital early, otherwise I might have had to take her eyeball out to save her life," Hung said, according to CNN. CTS News broadcast the press conference in a report published last week: