[fensgrim]

That specific blindness story was debunked later on (~month past initial report); something about having only a single unnamed source touting that story to multiple newspapers.

As a russian rave goer: my deepest thanks to aliexpress providing lots of reliable UV LED sources, X-Y lasers etc. It really keeps the (insane) DIY at bay.

> they were popular during covid

They were popular long before covid: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quarzlampe

TL;DR: invented in Germany, 1906; introduced as a nationwide cure for rickets in German children in 1920; adopted by soviet medicide nationwide in 1950s and never really went away

As for covid, it did trigger a number of insane DIY projects involving UV light sources; I like this one in particular - https://youtu.be/nFSkBsKAH-A?si=SLgdtdvLcNN-sTs0&t=187 (yep, that's a 125W streetlight mercury vapor lamp being stripped down into a hard UV hazard.. These go as far as 1000W, though 125W variation is most common and easily obtainable, at cost of $5 per lamp, and ~$30 on spare parts to get it up and running)