| Nutrition Facts
|
Posted on 05/20/2005 5:42:44 PM PDT by JimSEA
Health authorities yesterday warned villagers not to eat crickets or sell them as food after more than 100 people in Ban Phai district were hospitalised with nausea and diarrhoea this week. The patients all had eaten fried crickets that were bought either from a local market or from street hawkers.
A handful of villagers were hospitalised late Sunday night with nausea and diarrhoea, with the number swelling by around another 100 on Tuesday, said Ban Phai Hospital director Dr Prayoon Kowit.
All said they ate fried crickets that were either bought at Ban Phai Market or from street hawkers driving around villages, Prayoon said.
Fried-cricket samples have been sent to the Medical Science Centre to determine if people got sick because of unsanitary cooking conditions or toxic contamination, the doctor said.
Chu Latha, 73, who has been eating fried crickets for decades, said her son had bought raw crickets from Ban Phai market and then fried them.
Family members later developed nausea and diarrhoea after eating the insects and had to go to hospital, she said.
The Khon Kaen Health Office yesterday issued a warning urging villagers not to sell or eat cricket, no matter how well they were cooked.
The Nation
KHON KAEN
Okay, was it the crickets themselves that were the problem, or was it that they were using rancid fry oil?
> My wife said the crickets were OK except their legs kept getting stuck between her teeth.
Pthh!
(It's ok to drink the water, just don't eat the crickets :)
Just repeating what I have been told, there seems to be a problem if they are not raised in a fairly sterile environment. Perhaps they pick up some toxicity??
Okay, I can skip the crickets. Your wife is much braver than I would ever be.
If people have eaten these before with no problem, the crickets probably ate some pesticide-sprayed leaves or something else toxic. Ping me on the follow-up. This is fabulously interesting.
Maybe the crickets were sick.
It doesn't matter if cricket is Kosher or not. If you eat a sick animal it may make you sick.
This often turns out to be a case of the insect poison being stored to close to, or in the same looking container as, the flour or meal used to prepare the dish.
I've munched on a few crickets and mealworms from the vendors in Bangkok, tastes pretty good, but I shy away from the huge roaches or dragonflies or dung beetles.
"..If you wish upon an Star..."
| Nutrition Facts
|
Some species of crickets are hosts to parasites that can cause severe intestinal distress to humans. They aren't the sort of parasites that are easily treated, either...they cause persistent ulcers of the intestinal wall. I would never eat a cricket. Uugghh.
Oooohhhhhh-kay. I will choose another appetizer tonight. Thanks for the heads-up.
It's just a big damn bug:
Dang! And I just ate a whole super-sized cup of crickets from Thailand Joe's.
Well, luckily it's the weekend if I have to get sick.
Not my idea of snack food.
Crickets should never be deep fried in DDT.
They probably fried them in old transformer oil.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
The Fedral Gubment warned consumers today not to eat this stuff here. It's unhealthy. But after reading this thread, I'll bet it sounds pretty good. Especially compared to eating frigging bugs.