Adverse Food Reactions
- Some adverse reactions, can kill you.
Real Risk or Perceived Risk?
Ex. Salem, New Jersey
- Robert Gibbon Johnson, showed North America that tomatoes do not kill!
1850- English Physician Arthur Hasall saw that a steel fork became coated with copper when
he mashed gooseberries
1900's- chalk was added to watered down milk
- arsenic added to meat to prevent oxidization
- Indigo added to tea for colour
Unintentional Toxins
Naturally Occurring Toxins
Problems with Body Chemistry
Idiosyncratic Reactions
Contamination with Microbes
Unintentional Toxins
- pesticide contaminants
- amount allowed very carefully regulated
Aldicarb- used to treat cucumbers
- sold in concentrated solution to be diluted by farmer
- if mistake is made, can be catastrophic
Mercury- in fish
Naturally Occurring Toxins
- Natural-> safe, Synthetic-> dangerous... FALSE!!
- there are many dangerous toxins in nature
Mold:
- mycotoxins:
- toxic chemicals produced by mold
- found in canadian cereals
- Aflatoxins:
- most potent class of carcinogens to be tested
- natural mold!
- Tyramine
- chemical found in aged, fermented foods (cheeses + wine)
- can increase blood pressure
- people on certain anti-depressants, if they consume, they will have higher tyramine
level in blood stream, can trigger hypertension or stroke
Fish:
- harbour variety of bacteria that break down components of fish very quickly
- Scromboid Poisoning: occurs after eating fish that contain high levels of histamine.
Happens with fish with high amounts of histidine.
- allergy symptoms, tingling/burning in mouth, rash, headache, hives, itching, nausea,
vomiting
- treated with anti-histamines
- Ciguatera Poisoning: toxin produced by algae barracudas eat
- can wreck your life, sensations of temperature reversal and "un-well"
feeling can stay with you for life
- Puffer Fish: contains Tetrodotoxin
- always get a tingling feeling in fingers, then up the arm.
- Overdose: if tingling goes up passed the elbows.
- Voodoo doctors, learned to extract tetrodotoxin and give to people to
paralyse them
- "Zombie Cucumber"- Atropine and Scopolamine used to counteract
it, speeds up heart
- Muscles: can contain Domoic Acid, also comes form algae.
- side effects: loss of any long-term memory (there's a man who can only
remember the past 30 minutes)
Casava: can harbour Cyanide
- if not properly processed, one can die from cyanide poisoning
Licorice root: contains Glycyrrhizinic Acid
- causes excretion of potassium, which can cause paralysis
Comfrey: contains Pyrrolizidine Alkaloids
- can destroy liver
Body Chemistry Problems
Diabetes:
- need to stay away from sugar, keep blood-glucose levels low
Phenylketonurea (PKU): Genetic disease, affects 1 in 20 000 children.
- Inability to metabolize a common amino acid, phenylalanine
- builds up in brain
- kids with this need to stay away from it in early birth
- must stay away from aspartame
Lactose Intolerance:
- about 70% of population, most asians have it
- to diagnose: breath test, drink milk, test the amount of hydrogen you exhale
- if one does not have the enzyme Lactase, lactose will go through intestine into colon
and bacteria will digest it
- hydrogen gas gets produced, and is exhaled.
- Lactaid: milk which has lactase added
- can occur in different degrees
- Intolerance vs. Allergy
Fructose Malabsorption:
- if frustose is not absorbed, goes to colon, bacteria processes it
- causes diarrhea, tummy ache