Ptomaine Poisoning.

Te Aroha News, Volume XXVII, Issue 43338, 16 June 1908, Page 3

Ptomaine Poisoning.

es ,® days of tinned foods and xugh living we have all heard or read or ptomaine poisoning, but we are very ignorant of the chemical S aC S?° w kieh is the cause of it. r W * F. Boos summarises rather effectively some of the known facts concerning the actual poisons which can be distinguished when socalled ptomaine * poisoning takes place. Of these the most important, and in fact the only one which has been isolated in the pure state, is Sepsin,” and twenty millegrammes of this would probably poison anyone. By heating to above 60 deg. centigrade for an hour “ sepsin ” is changed to “cadaverine” and rendered innocuous ; from which one might jump to the conclusion that, since the poisoning from bad meat is , presence of “ sepsin,” cooked meat ought never to be poisonous. This is not quite the case, because in ordinary cooking processes the interior portions of the meat or fish may not reach a temperature sufficiently high to destroy the poison if present. Besides the poisoning by ptomaines, the question of bacterial poisoning ias also to be considered, though here is no essential difference in the )oisonous effect. Of one thing we nay be sure and that is that “ sep--I«?J).r e, * n quantities J.{“ ■ " “eat or game and, ‘though by the practice of eating his unwholesome food, a .certain moun t of artificial immunity against he poison can be gained, the safest ray is to eat ho food that has the lighest appearanee of unsavoury amt about it. Fresh and tough is etter for our health than tender Q j _ P® s °uous, • and well-cooked Kia ,better than that which is, only artially or badly prepared,