Surgeons remove 12 gold bars from Indian man's stomach
Wathiq Khuzaie/Getty Images
Surgeons called the three-hour operation to remove 12 gold bars from an Indian man's stomach earlier this month "tedious."
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The 63-year-old businessman visited his doctor in Delhi, saying he had swallowed a bottle cap out of anger. Instead, surgeons discovered 12 gold bars, weighing nearly a pound. India is the world's largest gold consumer, and people try to smuggle the substance into the country, because of the high duty costs.
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Doctors told the BBC that authorities were questioning the businessman, and that they had taken the gold, which is pretty brave, considering.
"I remember having taken out a bladder stone weighing 1kg from a patient," Dr. CS Ramachandran, a senior surgeon at Delhi's Sir Ganga Ram Hospital, said. "But finding gold in a patient's stomach was something unbelievable."
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Sarah Eberspacher is an associate editor at TheWeek.com. She has previously worked as a sports reporter at The Livingston County Daily Press & Argus and The Arizona Republic. She graduated from Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism.