Cassava kills 30 kids in Bohol

www.philstar.com ^ | 3 10 05 | Jose Sollano

[freepatriot32]

Thirty elementary school children died of food poisoning yesterday after eating a native delicacy made from cassava flour at the San Jose Elementary School in Mabini town, Bohol.

San Jose Vice Mayor Ester Tabigi said authorities had not yet determined exactly how many children had fallen ill, but at least 50 were still in critical condition last night in various hospitals in the nearby towns of Ubay and Talibon. Some children were brought as far as the provincial capital of Tagbilaran City, some 100 kilometers from Mabini.

Reports said the children, mostly second and third-grade pupils, started complaining of stomach pains and dizziness right after eating the cassava cake, known locally as maruya, during the morning recess at around 10:30.

"At 12 noon, teachers started to send victims to hospitals for treatment. Unfortunately, many of them failed to make it," said Philip Puderanan, public information officer of the Bohol Municipal Hall.

Senior Superintendent Sancho Bernales, chief of the Bohol police, said the children were taken to different hospitals in the province for medical treatment.

Military trucks reportedly helped bring the children to hospitals, the nearest of which was 20 to 30 kilometers away in Ubay town.

Of the 19 children taken to the Lita Cotamora Clinic in Ubay, 14 died and five were transferred to the nearby government-owned Don Emilio del Valle Hospital, where 20 other victims were confined. There were also two deaths reported at the Celestino Gallares Memorial Hospital in Tagbilaran.

Doctors who attended to the victims said food poisoning was the cause of death.

Sketchy reports said at least two women were responsible for selling the cassava cakes to the San Jose school children. One was identified as Aning Luyong, 60, who reportedly regularly sold snacks at the school. Luyong was said to have eaten the rest of the cassava cakes after the children fell ill and is now also in critical condition.

Another vendor, a 68-year-old woman, is reportedly now under the custody of Mabini town Mayor Stephen Rances.

"Kung puwedeng humingi kami ng tulong at mapa-imbestigahan ang pagkamatay ng mga bata. Kailangan namin ang mga experts para matulungan kami (We are appealing for help in investigating the cause of death of the children. We need experts)," Rances said yesterday.

Bohol Vice Gov. Julius Cesar Herrera said provincial health authorities in Tagbilaran will conduct further investigation to determine the victims’ exact cause of death.

The Department of Health has also sent medical experts to Mabini yesterday to investigate the incident. Tapped to conduct the probe were disease experts from the DOH’s Regional Service Unit in Bohol.

"The hospitals have enough manpower and supply to handle this. We are coordinating with our people in the field," Dr. Yolando Oliveros, head executive assistant of Health Secretary Manuel Dayrit, said.

Meanwhile, Bohol native George Evardo, a radio reporter, said cassava, known locally as balanghoy, should be cooked properly, especially during the hot season, as the wrong process can lead to bacterial poisoning. – With reports from Cecille Suerte Felipe, Shiela Crisostomo, AFP

[tnfarmer]

That`s what I always wondered about Poke Sallet,it`s poisonous unless cooked correctly.How did people first learn to eat it without dieing from it?

I still like a `mess` fixed at least once every spring.

[TaxRelief]

Not all varieties of Yuca contain the bitter poison. The poison, Glucoside, can be detected by the bitterness--the stronger the bitterness; the higher concentration of glucoside.

[Gatún(CraigIsaMangoTreeLawyer)]

Thank you for your reply.

It must be, and I must believe, as you say, "My suspicion is the cassava root can vary in the amount of cyanide it contains." Thank goodness there has never been an event where one drops dead from eating casaba here in Panama.

[Gatún(CraigIsaMangoTreeLawyer)]

"Not all varieties of Yuca contain the bitter poison. The poison, Glucoside, can be detected by the bitterness--the stronger the bitterness; the higher concentration of glucoside."

That is good to know. The yuca we have here is not bitter in any way, or we never would have been shaping false teeth form it and sticking it in our mouths. I suppose the folks here are lucky.

[dennisw]

Probably the more wild yucca varieties has more cyanide while the cultivated yucca has some cyanide but most has been bred out of it.

I read citrus was originally bitter, that oranges etc. had to be bred to be as sweet as they are today

[Gatún(CraigIsaMangoTreeLawyer)]

To be honest with you,dennisw, I really don’t know if Panama makes or imports yuca flour. I’ve never seen it on the supermarket shelves. I will take a look next time. The yuca frituras (fried yuca dishes) made here are from the freshly boiled yuca. The yuca is then mashed like thick mashed potatoes, stuffed, and fried. But I need to look into this yuca flour thing because of my curiosity.

[Frapster]

I read somewhere that this particular edible, when prepared improperly, produces cyanide as it's broken down. Two of the plants in question can apparently kill an adult. *shrug* Just relating what I read. I'll have to go back and see if I can find it.

[Gatún(CraigIsaMangoTreeLawyer)]

Yes, there are several vegetables and fruits we consume today that were not eatable in the past because of their bitterness or being too sour.

[cyborg]

I've been eating cassava all my life. Eaten it raw, eaten it as cereal... however if you don't cook the meat for pasteles well you can get sick.

[DB]

But enough to take you out hours after ingesting it? Tha't pretty potent.

[Alas Babylon!]

The yuka has a hard skin. What was fun, was taking this hard skin, after peeling way the outer portion of the skin, we, as children, used to take those discarded peelings and cut them into funny teeth and wear them in our mouths. None of us dropped dead from that. We are still around.

That's because it ISN'T the same thing. Yucca growing in the USA is not the tropical cassava plant used to make manioc. The problem is that in Latin America cassava is also known as yucca. But the yucca in the USA is a spike-leaved plant related to the pineapple, where the cassava plant know as yucca in Tropical America is a leafy bush. Here's a picture of a cassava plant:

Cassava is a perennial woody shrub, grown as an annual.

And a picture of USA yucca plant:

I'm in Alabama, and I have a big mound of yucca growing in the front yard. Nice flowers, but I'm not going to eat any of it!

[Gatún(CraigIsaMangoTreeLawyer)]

Yes, the first foto is the plant that grows here. Thank you.

[dennisw]

This is the yucca from supermarkets and that I've seen growing in me friend's back yard. I've also eaten his backyard yucca. Yucca isn't very mineral rich and has less protein than grains. But it does provide bulk and carbohydrates and can be the main food of a tropical diet in poor countries if other foods are eaten

I like boiled yucca root. It's a bland side dish but very nice along with other foods.

 

19 Steps to Making Yucca Bread

19 Steps to Making Yucca Bread Casabe is a thin, cracker-like bread made out of yucca. It is an important staple of the Garífuna diet and a custom inherited from the Arawak Indians, one of the Garífuna ancestors. The process to make casabe is as follows.
1. Harvest the yucca. Extract 18-20 pounds of this root.	2. Peel the yucca.	3. Wash and clean the yucca with seawater to give the roots a distinct salt flavor.
4. Grate the yucca with an egi, a wooden grating board embedded with small quartz stones.	5. Pack the shredded yucca into the ruguma, a 2-3 meter-long straining device woven out of palm leaves.	6. Hang the ruguma from the rafters.
7. Shake and stretch the ruguma to drain the poisonous liquid (cyanogenic glycoside) from the grated yucca.	8. Remove the yucca dough from the ruguma and leave covered with a towel to dry overnight.	9. The next morning, sift the yucca with the jívise (a large, braided sieve) to produce a refined flour.
10. Place firewood beneath the grill and light the stove.	11. Sprinkle chingaste (the material that did not pass through the jívise) onto the grill to determine the temperature.	12. When the stove is ready, scoop the yucca flour onto the grill.
13. Spread the flour over the grill, forming a round circle. Fill any holes with excess flour.	14. As the bread heats and begins to toast, sweep the loose flour away with a special yucca brush.	15. Sift a small amount of yucca flour onto the casabe.
16. Flatten the yucca bread with a wooden tool called the garagu.	17. Carefully flip the casave onto its other side. Sweep away any excess flour.	18. Flatten the bread with the garagu again. Brush and scrape off the extra flour. Use a knife to round the edges.
	Click here to order fresh casabe made by Garífuna peoples!
19. Remove the casabe from the grill and allow to cool. Make incisions so the bread can be broken into smaller portions. Eat and enjoy!

[cyborg]

Yeah that's it.

[libstripper]

Fox News had a report on this last night. It seems that when casava is prepared, it's possible to do a bad job of cleaning it and leave cyanide residue, cyanide being a naturally occurring part of some of the casava plant.

[BJClinton]

Wouldn't it take a heck of a lot of casava floor to have this level of toxicity?

[BJClinton]

Nevermind, apparently this kind of poisoning is quite common with cassava. Very sad.

[Coop]

No question in my mind that we should conform our food quality and inspection standards to those of South America, this to be politically correct.

Even on threads with devastating news, some of you people just cannot give it a rest.

[printhead]

I ask the same about the Japanese and the puffer fish.

[fishtank]

Tragedy.

However, a remark to the nuts who advocate a raw food diet (i.e the Hallelujah Diet) --- COOKING IS NOT EVIL!!!!