Living in a world of pain
Experts compare pain levels caused by non-lethal rubber bullets to various other kinds of trauma
There’s a metaphor for machismo that gets passed around sports team locker-rooms across the land. “Pain is weakness leaving the body.”
Science doesn’t back that up, really. According to pain researchers, your brain can experience hurt on a different scale than the person sitting next to you. Simply put, pain is largely subjective.
That’s a crucial issue as police forces across North America, including Toronto police, explore painful but less-lethal options to conventional weapons — including a new type of rubber bullet — in the wake of several high-profile fatal shootings.
Oakville-based Security Devices International has been filling orders for a bullet that expands on impact, causing massive pain to subdue an individual, but leaves no lasting injury.
We asked two pain researchers to compare, in general terms, the hurt experienced from rubber bullets compared with a variety of other sources. Here, we introduce the “Painometer,” the Star’s undoubtedly inexact way to measure pain.
Rubber bullet
Luda Diatchenko has never been shot with a rubber bullet.
She’s never spoken with someone who knows how much they hurt.
But, asked about the new rubber bullets bought by Toronto police, which flatten out on impact and don’t pierce the skin, the pain researcher at McGill University said she can imagine it’s not the most pleasant experience.
“I would say it can be dangerous. It can be very painful and it can create damage,” she said. “It can be the beginning of chronic pain.”
Min Zhuo hasn’t felt the sting of a rubber bullet, either. But asked to place it on the pain scale, the Canada Research Chair in pain and cognition and medical professor at the University of Toronto said it would fall between three and four. “They are not going to penetrate your tissue . . . It could cause more damage in a wider area.”
á Real bullet Obviously there are a lot of factors at play: where you get hit, what kind of gun and whether you’re expecting to feel the hot kiss of a speeding bullet. Zhuo said he’s found that anxiety levels affect how people feel pain. The more uptight or scared you are, the more pain you’re going to feel. So assuming you’re caught off-guard, and shot in a place that won’t kill you, Zhuo placed “Getting shot” between two and three on the Painometer.
á Taser/Electric shock Zhuo emphasized that this, too, depends on the voltage of the shock. “One parameter is the intensity, another parameter is the duration,” he said. Even so, he’d place getting zapped by a Taser at four. “It’s not very painful. When you get an electrical shock, you are shocking all the nerve fibres.”
á Stabbed Not unlike getting shot, there are many variables to the pain of getting stabbed. Assuming that significant muscle tissue is damaged by the blade, Zhuo pegged the pain at five. “That could be very painful.”
á Giving birth In Diatchenko’s research, she routinely asks subjects to rate their most painful experiences. For women, the highest rating is almost always childbirth.
“In pain research, if a woman is asked ‘What is pain?’10 is childbirth,” she said.
Zhuo agreed. “My wife told me it’s very painful.”
á Passing kidney stones When Diatchenko asks men “What is pain?” the top-rated answer is often “passing a kidney stone.” She rates that as 10 on the scale.
á Kick in the groin Having experienced this himself, Zhuo can attest that it hurts, but he said the main source of that pain is the fear and anxiety that surrounds the male predilection to safeguard the family jewels. “It’s more of the fear component,” he said, rating the pain at six on the scale. “We have very clear evidence that those anxious people, they’re going to perceive pain much, much longer and much more.”
á Baseball in the face Zhuo said he was hit with a soccer ball in the face once, and it hurt real badly. A baseball in the face? That’s got to be intense. “Our face sensory nerves are very close to the brain, so it can be very painful.” Painful enough to warrant a seven or eight on the scale.