Being Stung By This Plant Is the Worst Pain You Can Feel

It looks all cute and fuzzy...and then it causes you the worst pain EVER.

One of the world’s most venomous plants, the Gympie-Gympie stinging tree can cause months of excruciating pain for unsuspecting humans.

The Gympie Gympie is an Australian plant with spindly stems and heart-shaped light green leaves. Brushing your hand against it can make you throw up from the pain. It’s been described as being sprayed with hot acid and electrocuted at the same time.

A man was reported to have shot himself after using the tree as a toilet paper.

Every part of the plant is covered with tiny stinging hairs shaped like hypodermic needles except for its roots. That includes its stem, heart-shaped leaves and pink/purple fruit.

You only need to lightly touch the plant to get stung, after which the hair penetrates the body and releases a painful toxin called moroidin.

On a large leaf 30 cm by 20 cm there can be as many as 15,000 hairs on both sides of a single leaf.

One of the first people to document the adverse effects of the Gympie-Gympie sting was North Queensland road surveyor A.C. Macmillan, who reported to his boss in 1866 that his packhorse was ‘stung, got mad, and died within two hours’. Local folklore is also filled with similar tales of horses in agony jumping off cliffs and forestry workers drinking copiously in order to dull the pain.

This plant sounds like hell!!