Scary Clowns, Out of the Hospital!

Hospitals are being urged not to decorate children's wards with paintings of clowns in case they upset young patients.

State-funded research has found that in a survey of more than 250 children aged four to 16, all disliked the use of clowns in hospital decor, with even the teenagers seeing them as "scary".

 

A hospital clown; Children are 'scared of hospital clowns'

Ironic: children are more frightened of clowns than hospital

"Given that children and young people do not find hospitals frightening per se - and only express fear about those spaces associated with needles - this finding is somewhat ironic," said Dr Penny Curtis of Sheffield University.

Earlier this year, organisers of a music festival had to change their fancy dress circus theme after some ticket holders told them they had a phobia of clowns.

The Bestival, held on the Isle of Wight, had asked festival-goers to turn up in curly wigs and large shoes.

It would be sad if hospitals no longer had pictures of clowns, added [secretary of Clowns International, Tony] Eldridge, who is also a director of the Clown Museum in London.

"We live in a world where everything is banned and it has got rather silly."

Bad news for Coco and Blinko -- children don't like clowns and even older kids are scared of them.

The news that will no doubt have clowns shedding tears was revealed in a poll of youngsters by researchers from the University of Sheffield who were examining how to improve the decor of hospital children's wards.