A female football fan with a vuvuzela
If you thought vuvuzelas were just a television irritant then think again - the three foot horns have claimed their first victim.

Insurance saleswoman Yvonne Mayer ripped her windpipe after getting a little over enthusiastic with her vuvuzela during a street party in Cape Town.

She was unable to speak or eat for two days after doctors diagnosed her with a ruptured throat and she was warned off the instrument.

"I had never blown a vuvuzela before but was given one at work and was going to watch the first South Africa match so thought I'd take it along," she told the Daily Mail.

"I was walking towards the Fan Park in Cape Town and blowing it as hard as I could when suddenly my throat started to hurt.

"When I went to the doctor he took a look and then laughed. He said I'd ruptured by throat by blowing too hard, and that perhaps I had been doing it all wrong."

Yvonne has now warned other footie fans to take care with their plastic trumpets.

"This happened to me on my first time," she said. "I thought I was blowing it right but perhaps I was trying too hard."

A German supporter, on the other hand, was diagnosed with tinnitus when a fellow fan blew the horn right next to him.

"It was so loud that I passed out. When I came round I couldn't hear properly in one ear - it was just permanent ringing," said Sven Wipperfurth.

We can only hope that this year's World Cup will be the last we hear of the vuvuzela.