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An NYC woman is issuing a harrowing warning after her hands were left covered in agonizing second-degree burns following a seemingly harmless afternoon making margaritas.
Haley Peacock, a Brooklyn-based designer, shared a now-viral TikTok documenting her experience with “margarita burn,” a condition triggered by handling citrus before heading into the sun.
In a follow up video, she pleads to users “please, please, please, do not squeeze citrus and then go lay in the sun.”
“And if you do, please wash your hands with soap like 17 times,” she emphasized, highlighting the necessity of thorough cleaning.
The freak accident occurred while Peacock was hosting a birthday celebration for her boyfriend upstate, during which she hand-squeezed approximately 30 limes to prepare a large batch of cocktails for 25 guests.
Thinking a quick rinse with water was sufficient, she spent the remainder of the day relaxing by the pool, unaware of the chemical reaction beginning on her skin. For the rest of the day, everything seemed normal.
By the following day the consequences were undeniable: her hands had become alarmingly red, swollen, and intensely painful.
“After I was finished with squeezing all of the limes, I ran my hands under the sink,” Peacock recalled in the video, explaining the progression of her injuries.
“I didn’t think much of it — my hands didn’t feel sticky or anything, and I knew we were just going to be by the pool and in the pool all day, so I just really didn’t think — I don’t know. It didn’t really cross my mind,” she added.
The day after she got back to Brooklyn, fluid-filled blisters — some reaching the “size of golf balls” — engulfed her hands, requiring medical treatment and heavy bandaging.
“My whole hand is discolored,” she said, after receiving treatment for the second-degree burns at urgent care.
“There are blisters the size of golf balls — one on my thumb and one by my ring finger.”
Margarita burn, or “phytophotodermatitis,” is a severe inflammatory skin reaction that occurs when photosensitizing chemical compounds in plant juices — such as limes — interact with UV light from the sun, causing tissue damage and blistering akin to chemical burns.
“I commonly see phytophotodermatitis when somebody has been barbecuing on a sunny afternoon and having drinks with limes in them, like margaritas or beers with a lime squeezed in,” Dermatologist Melissa Piliang told the Cleveland Clinic.
While lime juice is the most frequent culprit, dermatologists note that celery, figs, fennel, carrots, and parsley can also trigger the condition when exposed to sunlight.
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