Symptoms of cassava intoxication, cassava poisoning (2024)

Symptoms of cassava intoxication, cassava poisoning appear after eating cassava with symptoms such as headache, pain in limbs, abdominal pain,... The reason is that in cassava contains cyanhydric acid that causes poisoning and even poisoning. can even be fatal if tolerated in large quantities.

Cassava is a popular food in our country, especially in rural and mountainous areas. Cassava poisoning is often called cassava intoxication by people in our country. Symptoms of poisoning with severe acute or mild poisoning will depend on the amount of cassava eaten more or less, with clinical manifestations after eating cassava are:

Patient feels headache, dizziness, nausea. Then there are manifestations of neurological disorders, the patient feels fear, convulsions, muscle spasms like a tetanus, dilated pupils, slow breathing, cyanosis.
Symptoms of cyanhydric acid poisoning: this acid inhibits the activity of respiratory enzymes, especially cytochrome oxidase and Warburg red enzymes, making the tissues unable to use oxygen. Digestive disorders such as: abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting and diarrhea. Nervous disorders such as: dizziness, headache or worse may convulsions, convulsions, dilated pupils and then coma. Respiratory disorders such as suffocation, cyanosis, acute respiratory failure will cause rapid death. If not treated promptly, the patient will die within 30 minutes. In contrast, patients can recover completely without leaving sequelae if treated early.

For moderate and mild cassava poisoning, the patient has symptoms such as headache, dizziness, nausea, body fatigue, dry nose and throat. The patient can return to normal when lying down and drinking a cup of hot sugar water.

The cause of cassava poisoning after eating is because cassava contains a toxic substance called glucoside, concentrated mainly in the peel, the two ends of the cassava. When meeting with digestive enzymes, acid or water, the glucoside will be hydrolyzed and release cyanhydric acid, acetone and glucose, so the toxicity of cassava is mainly due to cyanhydric acid. Any type of cassava contains glucoside with an average content of 3-5 mg %. The more bitter the taste of cassava, the higher the amount of glucoside, sometimes up to 10-15 mg%.
The lethal dose is 1mg/kg body weight. For adults, the toxic dose is 20mg of cyanhydri acid, the fatal dose is 50mg of cyanhydric acid for adults weighing about 50kg, for the elderly, children and infirm people, the dose will be lower.
Characteristic of the poison in cassava is very volatile, they dissolve easily in cold water as well as hot water. When oxidized or combined with a sugar substance, it will be converted into a non-toxic substance. Based on this characteristic of cassava, if you know how to process it properly, the toxic content will be eliminated to a large extent. After being peeled, soaked in water for a while, boiled and cooled, the toxic content is reduced to only 30% of the original. Besides, the toxic content will be reduced to very little and not capable of causing toxicity to people even though consumed in large quantities is when processed in the form of cut into slices to dry, processed into cassava flour, cassava ,...
In short, cassava is a popular food in our country, especially in rural and mountainous areas. Symptoms of cassava poisoning with severe acute or mild poisoning will depend on the amount of cassava eaten more or less such as neurological disorders, respiratory disorders, severe cases can lead to death. Therefore, to prevent poisoning when eating cassava, it is necessary to process cassava properly to reduce the maximum amount of toxins.

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