Child-killer lychee mystery finally solved, findings show study published in the medical journal The Lancet Global Health. Researchers from the National Center for Disease Control in Delhi, India, who have been pondering a deadly conundrum for several years, have figured out the cause of unexplained child deaths in the state of Bihar every year between May and July. It is believed to be due to lychee poisoning carrying toxins which, associated with hypoglycemia, causes neurological damage and death.
Hypoglycemia and fruit toxin: the deadly combination
How is it possible that lychee, an edible and sweet tropical fruit, can cause fatal hypoglycemic encephalopathy in children? The answer is simple, but it took researchers several years to find it: these edible fruits and other fruits of the soap family (Sapindaceae) contain unusual amino acids that disrupt blood sugar levels and the oxidation of fatty acids. As a result, malnourished and often hypoglycemic children who consume excess fallen, immature and damaged fruit are prone to fevers, seizures, behavioral disturbances, coma, symptoms of encephalopathy. 44% of them die from it.
This mechanism had already been identified in Jamaica. Indeed, researchers already knew that consuming unripe ackee fruit caused toxic hypoglycemic encephalopathy (Jamaican vomiting disease) in children.
Scientists from the Indian National Center for Disease Control and the Indian Bureau of Centers for Disease Control and Prevention analyzed the urine of 300 small patients and found it to contain a toxin found in lychees. But, it is the combination of several factors that gives this disease a lethal character. Indeed, the affected children were most often malnourished and tended to binge on fruit while they were hypoglycaemic. However, it worsens with lychee toxins in the body. A vicious circle that researchers have managed to break.
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