The Argentine woman who suffered burns to 90 percent of her body after visiting a solarium offering two sunbed sessions for the price of one has claimed that they paid her cash to “keep my mouth shut”.
Paula Ferro, from the neighbourhood of Villa Pueyrredon in the Argentine capital Buenos Aires, said she went to the local solarium because they had a two-for-one promotional offer.
Taking advantage of the offer, Paula said she decided to do both sunbed sessions on 18th November 2021, claiming that the two 15-minute bookings took place in one half-hour sitting.
After the sessions, she said the “pain was unbearable” after being “burned to my eyelids”, complaining: “They didn’t even give me protection for my eyes.”
At the time, Paula took to Twitter to share images of her sunbed injuries, explaining: “I have 90 percent of my body burned raw. I can’t sleep, sit up, or even blink because I am burned up to my eyelids. I can’t even dress myself.”
She admitted that staff warned her beforehand that she “would look a little red”, but she had a wedding invitation for the Saturday and thought any redness would have faded in the two days leading up to the event.
She said everything seemed normal when she left the solarium, but things changed a couple of hours later when her skin began to turn very red.
Paula added: “After three hours I had a fever and was shaking like it was 10 degrees below zero. My blood pressure dropped, I wanted to vomit, I couldn’t eat or drink.”
She said she slept as best she could that night, but things got worse the following day: “As soon as I got up, I almost fainted from the drop in blood pressure and I really wanted to vomit.”
Paula visited a local health centre, where staff recommended that she go to hospital for burns treatment.
Following treatment at the hospital, Paul was allowed to go home with monitoring taking place over the following days.
Paula said her dermatologist recommended that she have her heart and kidneys checked after suffering dehydration.
She also said that she was unable to breastfeed her two-year-old daughter, adding: “It could have ended really badly.”
She warned others that “it is not worth going through all that sh*t just for a little colour”, and vowed to “never do it again”.
Paula has now claimed that the solarium paid her cash to keep quiet about the incident, saying: “I sent them a message because they did not show up and they told me they were going to take care of everything, but that it was my responsibility.
“They paid me ARS 12,000 (GBP 85), nothing more. Surely, to make me keep my mouth shut.”
However, despite the allegation, and saying “the reality is that my life was at stake”, Paula admits that she is still hesitant about taking legal action against the solarium.
