The world was introduced to a new health hazard on Monday. The scary part is, this danger surrounds us. It's not cigarettes, and it's not sharp objects.

It's skinny jeans.

The headlines could make you tremble.

Story continues below advertisement

"Doctors warn against dangers of skinny jeans."

"Doctors say skinny jeans could damage nerves and muscles."

The fashion hysteria was prompted by the case of a 35-year-old woman in Australia who suffered damage to her muscle and nerve fibres in her legs after spending hours squatting in skinny jeans as she helped a family member move.

The next day, the woman was hospitalized, and couldn't walk normally for four days.

Researchers who explored the case in the Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery & Psychiatry called it a "new neurological complication of wearing tight jeans."

But don't go running for a pair of sweat pants in the name of safety just yet, says Dr. Michael Sommers, a chiropractor in Toronto.

"Have I seen a couple cases of meralgia paresthetica, where some part of the lower leg becomes a little bit tingly and numb? Certainly," he says. "Does it go away very quickly when you don't wear those pants? Yes."

Story continues below advertisement

The more important question, probably, is this one: "Did this person have any business doing any kind of significant physical activity in constricting clothing? No," Sommers says. "This sort of thing poses no risk typically to people because they're not going to go spend hours moving boxes and exerting [themselves] while in ultra-constricting clothing."

Whatever pants you want to wear, try to notice the cues you get from your body in them, not just how good you might look.

"Pay attention to what your body is telling you," Sommers says. "This person experienced a whole bunch of pain and discomfort moving the day before. That's your body communicating with you and saying, 'I think there's a problem here.'"