The case of the young man who died after eating noodles: the dangerous bacteria that can grow in a pasta dish – 05/02/2019

The unusual case happened eight years ago, but the badysis made about it by a scientific journal has refocused it. A young Belgian died in 2011 after eating a plate of overheated pasta. But the person responsible for his death was not the spaghetti, but a habit that he had and that can be very dangerous: he prepared the food, kept it in containers and heated it for a few days with some sauce. The problem was that he did not refrigerate it.

As published in the Journal of Clinical Microbiology, the pasta had been prepared five days earlier. After half an hour he would have started to experience abdominal pain, nausea and headache, vomiting and diarrhea, but he did not go to a medical center. He drank water and tried to sleep. The next day his parents found him already dead. The autopsy revealed that he died about 10 hours after ingestion of the paste by Hepatic necrosis and signs of acute pancreatitis.

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At autopsy, they also found, in fecal smears, bacteria responsible for everything: Bacillus Cereus, responsible for the famous "Fried Rice Syndrome", a food poisoning that can occur after eating fried rice if it was not refrigerated.

Does this case confirm that eating a dish of pasta or overheated rice can be deadly if it is not kept in good condition? "Yes, anything can happen in case of contamination. The paste can be the substrate in which a series of harmful bacteria proliferates. Although the problem in this case does not concern pasta or fried rice, freshly boiled pasta is sterile because cooked. The problem is that keeping at room temperature may be subject to contamination which, in this case, should have occurred in the first few days after the abandonment of the pasta without refrigeration, so that there was a time of incubation, proliferation. There are bacteria that can generate toxins. If this is the case, heating food is not a solution to eliminate them, "explained Spanish biologist and nutritionist Juan Revenga.

With him, the doctor of science and technology of food, Miguel Angel Lurueña, author of the blog Gominolas of Petróleo, accepted. "If food cooked at room temperature is left, various pathogenic microorganisms may develop, including some that are resistant to high temperatures or that produce high temperature resistant toxins. warm up is not enough to eliminate the risk"On this specific case, he added that the"Bacillus Cereus It is a bacterium that can cause two types of symptoms: diarrhea, caused by ingestion of food contaminated with a large number of bacteria, and emetics (vomiting) caused by ingestion toxins produced by this bacteria. It is not usual to cause death, but cases have been recorded. "In 2003, five members of one family became ill because of poisoning badociated with this bacteria, due to the consumption of a pasta salad for eight days during a spades. The youngest, seven years old, is dead.

This bacterium usually proliferates in carbohydrates such as pasta or rice because it has enzymes called amylases and can be fed by digesting starch. The fundamental problem lies in the preservation of food because, although cooked at high temperature, the bacteria can survive as spores that could then germinate when the temperature drops. Therefore, to avoid contamination by this bacteria and its toxins, it is recommended to keep food at a temperature below 4 degrees and cook at a temperature above 100 degrees.

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Ingesting food in poor condition is a serious and global problem. According to a study conducted for eight years by the World Health Organization and published in 2015, 420,000 people die each year around the world from eating food in poor condition. Of this total, 30 per cent are children under five and developing countries are more affected.

Of course, anyone who ingests cooked pasta or rice will not die, but precautions this must be taken into account to avoid food poisoning.

– A fundamental element is fundamental keep food in the refrigerator. Pasta and rice, stored for up to three days, should not be dangerous.

– Refrigerate as soon as possibleraw foods (especially those of animal origin) and cooked foods that remained.

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– Wash hands, utensils, surfaces and certain foods like fruits and vegetables.

– Cooking food at sufficient temperature and time to eliminate the possible presence of pathogenic microorganisms. For example, curd eggs, cooking chicken, etc.

– Avoid cross-contaminationthat is, to prevent food that is already ready to eat from coming into contact with dirty / raw food because the contamination of the latter would reach the first.

– respect the expiry dates food.

Source: The Vanguardia