p. 16 | The Deadly Ptomaine

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Apr 21, 1898

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 24, No. 16.

The Deadly Ptomaine.

—A New York paper, on one page, recently contained accounts of serious sickness and death from the eating of herrings, ice-cream, oysters, shad roe, etc., etc.,—all from animal foods. One expert says that ptomaine poisoning is “poisoning from fish, oysters, clams, lobsters, mussels, milk, cream, cheese, etc. The ptomaine gaining admission is already in a soluble state, is quickly absorbed, and symptoms usually develop early. There is much similarity in symptoms, and they may be grouped under the following divisions: (1) A gastrointestinal irritation, with vomiting, purging, cold, clammy skin, anxious countenance, and much depression. (2) Purely nervous, a sensation of heat, itching, nettle-rash eruptions, swelling, asthmatic breathing, etc. (3) A kind of intoxication, with dizziness, muscular weakness, muscular spasm, paralysis, and death.”

The moral of this is that the most diseased foods are animal foods, and the quicker they are discarded, with judicious wisdom in the change, the better.