I’m going to preface this with the fact that it’s still unknown as of yet how Edward Archbold died but the facts are as follows:
- Archibold enters a live insect eating contest for the prize of an Ivory Female Bald Python
- Archibold manages to choke down more bugs and roaches than anyone else, winning the contest
- Shortly after celebrating his “grand” victory Archibold fell ill and collapsed in front of the store.
- He was then taken to a local hospital where he was pronounced dead.
Florida store owner (seriously FL, what the hell?!) Ben Siegel said that Archibold did not appear to be ill before the contest adding that, “We feel terribly awful. He looked like he just wanted to show off and was very nice.”
As a female, I have a natural aversion to all things creepy crawl-y (it’s almost as bad as Logan is with spiders) so to me, entering a contest where the only prize I would win upon the completion of the vomit inducing task of eating cockroaches is a SNAKE, it holds about as much appeal as Sex and the City would be to any average guy.
According to Michael Adams, professor of entomology at the University of California at Riverside, said he had never heard of somebody dying after consuming cockroaches. He also stated that, ”Unless the roaches were contaminated with some bacteria or other pathogens, I don’t think that cockroaches would be unsafe to eat. Some people do have allergies to roaches, but there are no toxins in roaches or related insects.”
Not to mention the bugs that Archibold ate were from an inventory of insects ‘that are safely and domestically raised in a controlled environment as food for reptiles.’
The Ben Siegel’s Reptile Store posted a message on its Facebook page: ’All we know is that sadly he has passed on. Please respect the privacy of the family as they try to determine what happened. Our thoughts and prayers go out to Eddie’s family in this terrible time. Although we just met Eddie the night of the sale, we all liked him right away. All of us here at Ben Siegel Reptiles are sad that we will not get to know Eddie better, for in the short time we knew him, he was very well liked by all.’
Authorities are waiting autopsy results to determine the cause of death.
To me though, it feels like a scene straight out of Creep Show:
Would you eat live cockroaches for a prize? If so, how many would you eat?
