Justin Schmidt: The Man Stung by More Than 150 Insect Species for Science

Advancing science demands immense determination, rigor, and, in the case of a famous American entomologist, a remarkably strong tolerance for pain.

A Vocation Born Very Early

As Justin Schmidt wrote in the Guardian in 2018, his vocation began when he was seven years old. Fascinated by the reaction produced by a bee’s sting on his teacher’s hand, the budding scientist deliberately exposed himself to nearly all of the stinging insects species recorded in the Appalachian region over the ensuing years.

These experiences essentially taught him that each sting was unique. And it was this very point that ultimately steered him toward entomology. He passed away in 2023 at the age of 75, leaving a substantial scientific legacy.

During his long career, he notably created “Schmidt’s Pain Index”, describing and ranking on a scale of 1 to 4 the stings inflicted by Hymenoptera, a large order of insects that includes ants, bees, and wasps.

Schmidt’s Pain Index

For instance, the man placed stings from the Halictidae family at the bottom of the scale, described as “mild and fleeting, akin to a tiny ember reddening a hair on your arm”, at the lower end of the scale. The second rung includes that of the yellow jacket, “burning and throbbing”, and the third that of the red ant, “bold and relentless,” and “comparable to using a drill to extract an ingrown nail”.

At the top of the scale, one finds the famous bullet ant (Paraponera clavata). According to Schmidt, the pain was comparable to “walking on hot coals with a rusted 7-centimeter nail driven into the heel”.

Only the stings of Pepsis wasps, known for attacking tarantulas, and Synoeca, came close in intensity. By comparison, the pain lasts no more than two minutes, whereas P. clavata can cause pain for up to 24 hours.

If the American entomologist estimated having been stung about a thousand times by more than 150 different insect species, a Brazilian biologist, for his part, walked on more than 40,000 venomous snakes to push science forward.