A PATHOLOGIST and coroner have issued warnings at an inquest into the death of a 67-year-old man about the risks to which people are exposing themselves when working with farm animals.
Pathologist Fadel Bennani said yesterday that in Co Mayo alone over the past three years three people had died in incidents involving cattle.
Two of the fatalities involved bulls, while the third, that of David Walsh, of Goulboy, Kiltimagh, involved a cow that pushed a gate against him as it was exiting a cattle crush, causing him to stumble backwards into a wall 15ft away. Mr Walsh, whose left shoulder and head took the force of the impact, died from his injuries two days later in hospital.
At the inquest into Mr Walsh’s death, Dr Bennani said a postmortem showed he had died from a massive subdural haemorrhage on January 9th at Mayo General Hospital. His advice to farmers dealing with cattle was to be “very careful”. A head injury to anyone over 50 should be taken very seriously, said Dr Bennani.
The risks of a subdural haemorrhage starting six hours after an incident was very high. Dr Bennani agreed with the coroner, John O’Dwyer, that Mr Walsh’s life might have been saved had he gone to hospital earlier.
Echoing the pathologist’s warning, the coroner said anyone sustaining a head injury should be brought to hospital immediately for observation.
A verdict of accidental death was recorded.