Chinese woman fractures 4 ribs while coughing after eating spicy food

KATHMANDU: One of the most absurd stories from China has been catching wind on the Internet. A woman who fractured four of her ribs after having a coughing fit has shocked the world. The report by SCMP suggests that the woman launched into a deadly coughing fit after eating some very spicy food.

Chinese woman coughs and breaks her ribs after eating spicy food

The woman is being referred to as Huang (her surname) in reports. She shared with the outlet that after she had a series of coughing fits, she heard the sound of cracking coming from her chest. The Shanghai native did not think much of the sound and went on with her daily life until the pain started to pierce her deeply.

Huang recounted that after she had dismissed her initial note of the crack, she soon started to encounter difficulty in breathing and felt excruciating pain while talking. Her awful realisation days later that something had gone terribly wrong led her to consult a doctor about her pain.

The doctor suggested getting a CT scan of her chest to find out the root cause of her discomfort. What the doctor and Huang did not know was that she had broken four of her ribs on that dreadful day, and the scan clearly showed it. The situation shocked not only Huang but also the doctor. For treatment, the doctor bandaged her chest tight and advised her to rest for over a month to let her broken ribs heal back to the way they were.

The crack in her rib was caused by her extremely low body weight

According to the doctor, the root cause of her fractured ribs was Huang’s low body weight. The Chinese woman is 171 cm tall but only weighs 57 kilograms, which is considerably low for her body size. The anonymous doctor told Huang, “Your ribs can be seen clearly under your skin. There is no muscle to support the bone, so it’s easy for your ribs to get fractured when coughing.”

Understanding the gravity of her situation, Huang quickly made plans to change her lifestyle and become more healthy in order to avoid such a drastic injury after a simple coughing fit. To increase her muscle mass and upper body weight, Huang told the outlet that she will be working hard to keep up a heavy physical exercise routine. The doctor had especially pointed out that she had a low body weight that could cause her trouble in the future, so Huang took his advice seriously and planned her next steps once she recovered from the injury.