# How long can a person survive... without skin? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 29, 2000, 4:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-can-a-person-survive-without-skin/43149 "2000-11-29T04:55:54Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Uniball](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Uniball](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uniball)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2000, 4:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-can-a-person-survive-without-skin/43149/1 "2000-11-29T04:55:54Z")
Just saw the new Robbie Williams clip, Rock DJ or something. Ew. But that’s not the point. The point is: if a person is skinned alive, how long will s/he live? Hours? Days? Years? ---
**Author:** ![peace](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c68b51/32.png) [@peace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/peace)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2000, 5:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-can-a-person-survive-without-skin/43149/2 "2000-11-29T05:03:18Z")
May be an hour. Till they loose ~30% of their blood. ---
**Author:** ![City\_Gent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a87d85/32.png) [@City\_Gent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/City_Gent)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2000, 5:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-can-a-person-survive-without-skin/43149/3 "2000-11-29T05:45:32Z")
No idea about losing all one’s skin, but I have heard about someone who lost a very vital part of his skin… My wife the doctor had a diabetic patient who had extensive necrosis of his scrotum. They ended up removing his scrotum to stop the necrosis and the guy had to spend several days in bed with his totally exposed nuts on a little pillow. Finally, they took his nuts off completely. I don’t know why they (a) didn’t just take his nuts off when they removed his scrotum, or (b) put his nuts inside his abdominal cavity where they could live out their natural lives. ---
**Author:** ![dennysmojo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/54ee81/32.png) [@dennysmojo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dennysmojo)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2000, 6:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-can-a-person-survive-without-skin/43149/4 "2000-11-29T06:00:47Z")
what the…oversharing citygent ---
**Author:** ![Uniball](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Uniball](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uniball)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2000, 6:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-can-a-person-survive-without-skin/43149/5 "2000-11-29T06:05:24Z")
Ew. I just ate circus peanuts, dammit! ---
**Author:** ![Fiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e274bd/32.png) [@Fiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fiver)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2000, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-can-a-person-survive-without-skin/43149/6 "2000-11-29T15:45:20Z")
Skin is a very important part of our immune systems. If we were skinned we would be prone to infection all over our bodies. Bacteria, viruses, mycoplasma, very small insects…it would be a feeding frenzy! Our lymphatic and circulatory systems would struggle desperately to meet the thousands or millions of simultaneous breaches of the perimeter, at the same time it’s also trying to repair the injury itself (imagine a whole-body scab). It would fail at both efforts. Even with prompt and state-of-the-art medical attention (massive doses of antibiotics, lots of bandages) you’d probably die of shock or heart failure before all the infections had time to kill you. I’m not a doctor, but my guess is a skinned person would be terminal within a few hours at most. ---
**Author:** ![CrankyAsAnOldMan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crankyasanoldman/32/11670_2.png) [@CrankyAsAnOldMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CrankyAsAnOldMan)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2000, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-can-a-person-survive-without-skin/43149/7 "2000-11-29T15:48:16Z")
The big problem, I thought, was with hydration. Your fluid loss without skin is phenomenal. It’s a major challenge with serious burn victims. ---
**Author:** ![Stupendous\_man](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a8b319/32.png) [@Stupendous\_man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stupendous_man)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2000, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-can-a-person-survive-without-skin/43149/8 "2000-11-29T16:54:03Z")
Well this certainly is an interesting question. Without skin, we would not only lost=e a lot of blood, be prone to hyper-infection, and be a giant scab, but we also would have a helluva time regulating our heat, since the skin’s sweat glands take care of this for us. I maintain that shock alone from losing it all would leave you dead within a few minutes at the most. ---
**Author:** ![BunnyGirl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/22d042/32.png) [@BunnyGirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BunnyGirl)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2000, 9:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-can-a-person-survive-without-skin/43149/9 "2000-11-29T21:15:26Z")
Cool song…weird video. Very weird. ---
**Author:** ![Gunslinger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/4491bb/32.png) [@Gunslinger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gunslinger)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2000, 11:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-can-a-person-survive-without-skin/43149/10 "2000-11-29T23:10:55Z")
::whips out an overly large carrot peeler:: C’mere, Uni, let’s do a science experiment… ---
**Author:** ![Uniball](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Uniball](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uniball)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2000, 1:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-can-a-person-survive-without-skin/43149/11 "2000-11-30T01:07:10Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Gunslinger \* > \*\*::whips out an overly large carrot peeler:: > > C’mere, Uni, let’s do a science experiment… \*\* Thanks but no thanks. I like my skin where it is. ---
**Author:** ![BigGiantHead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b4bc9f/32.png) [@BigGiantHead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigGiantHead)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2000, 1:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-can-a-person-survive-without-skin/43149/12 "2000-11-30T01:25:19Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Uniball \* > \*\*Ew. I just ate circus peanuts, dammit! \*\* I’m confused here. Is the ‘ew’ due to the [peanut-eating](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a5_222b.html), or **City Gent** ’s overly expressive story? 😃 -Dave ---
**Author:** ![Whammo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8dc957/32.png) [@Whammo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whammo)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2000, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-can-a-person-survive-without-skin/43149/13 "2000-11-30T03:30:17Z")
People survive (occasionally) after having 3rd degree burns on over 90% of their body… original skin is gone at that point I would say. If treated right medically maybe so could a skining victim? You’re all a bunch of sick fuckers if you ask me. 😛