Cholera Strikes In Ne

[seonai]

Cholera alert over cockles

The Public Health Ministry is keeping a close eye on 12 provinces for signs of cholera after several people died from eating half-cooked food.

Disease Control Department (DCD) director general Dr Thawat Suntrajarn said yesterฌday checks had been made on the spread of cholera across the country from January to November. It uncovered 761 people with severe diarrhoea caused by cholera, seven of whom had died.

Thawat said the ministry had brought the disease under control but close monitoring was needed in Khon Kaen, Udon Thani, Sakhon Nakhon, Lamphun, Roi Et, Maha Sarakham, Kalasin, Nakhon Phanom, Samut Sakhon, Nong Khai, Ayutthaya and Mukdahan.

Most people in the provinces still ate halfcooked food like cockles, which was sometimes tainted with cholera bacteria. This caused severe diarrhoea.

Thawat said the Laos Public Health Ministry claimed it had found cholera bacteria in fresh cockles imported from the Northeast of Thailand. But he rejected the claim, as Thailand had never exported fresh cockฌles to Laos.

He said the Fisheries Department also had not found any contamination in cockle farms across the country.

He believed the contaminaฌtion found in Laos might have occurred during transport after a merchant crossed the border and bought cockles for shipฌment back to his country.

by Pongphon Sarnsamak

The Nation. 20/11/07

[Talisman]

Just too report: There are quite a few cases at the moment around the Kalasin area. The local hospitals have significant numbers of people undergoing rehydration via saline IV's.

Folks reckon that it's being contracted from cockles brought in from the Mukdahan area, perhaps brought across from Laos.

[blizzard]

whats cockies?

[sbk]

cockles not cockie. Google is an amazing tool:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cockle_%28bivalve%29

Cockle is the common name for bivalve mollusks of the family Cardiidae. Shells of various species of cockles are commonly found on many beaches throughout the world. The distinctive rounded shells of cockles are symmetrical, heart-shaped when viewed from the end, and in most but not all genera there are numerous pronounced ribs.

The mantle has three apertures (inhalant, exhalant, and pedal) for siphoning water and for the foot to protrude. Cockles typically burrow using the foot, and feed by siphoning water in and out, sifting plankton from it. They are also capable of 'jumping' by bending and straightening the foot. Unlike most bivalves, cockles are hermaphroditic and reproduce quickly.

Cockles picked from Morecambe Bay

In cuisine and culture

Cockles are a popular type of edible shellfish in both Eastern and Western cooking. They are still collected, as they have been since time immemorial, by raking them from the sands at low tide. However, the labour of collecting cockles is hard and, as seen from the Morecambe Bay disaster, in which 21 illegal immigrants died, can be dangerous if local tidal conditions are not carefully watched.

Cockles are sold freshly cooked as a snack food in the United Kingdom, and are eaten with vinegar. Seafood stalls sell them along with mussels, whelks, and eels. They are also available pickled in jars and, more recently, they are sold in convenient sealed packets (with vinegar) containing a plastic two-pronged fork.

Boiled cockles are sold at many hawker centers in South East Asia, and are used in laksa, char kway teow and steamboat (food).

Consumption of raw cockles has been linked to hepatitis.

[WaiWai]

Consumption of raw cockles has been linked to hepatitis.

Which might explain the demise of Molly Malone .

Irish Folksong

1. In Dublin's fair city,

Where girls are so pretty,

I first set my eyes on sweet Molly Malone,

As she pushed her wheelbarrow

Through streets broad and narrow,

Crying, "Cockles and mussels, alive, alive oh"!

Chorus:

Alive, alive oh! alive, alive oh!

Crying, "Cockles and mussels, alive, alive oh"!

2. Now she was a fishmonger,

And sure twas no wonder,

For so were her mother and father before,

And they each wheeled their barrow,

Through streets broad and narrow,

Crying, "Cockles and mussels, alive, alive oh"!

Chorus:

3. She died of a fever,

And no one could save her,

And that was the end of sweet Molly Malone.

Now her ghost wheels her barrow,

Through streets broad and narrow,

Crying, "Cockles and mussels, alive, alive oh"!

Chorus:

[plachon]

Thanks WaiWai for that rendition of Molly Malone. Was it a Flanders and Swann number or way before them?

Cockles are risky food for more than just the bacteria/cholera angle, but being at the foot of the food chain and filter feeders, they also do a great job at filtering out all the heavy metals and other toxins that find their way from land to sea via Thailand's rivers. So even if well-cooked, you could be ingesting several year's worth of mercury and lead during consumption, esp. if beds are in upper Gulf of Thailand and other pollution backspots. Mind you, even the fish are supposed to be heavily contaminated by mercury too these days from the Gulf, and it's supposed to be as much related to the oil rigs as on-land sources.

I love the denial of Thai responsibility of Lao cholera outbreaks by the Disease Control Dept., by saying "Thailand doesn't export cockles to Laos". Well, maybe not officially, but as anyone who has seen the border crossings at Nong khai, Nakhon Phanom, Mukdahan, etc., will know that Lao traders come over to Thailand and buy tons of Thai cockles as they're cheap and are seen as exotic for landlocked Laotians, who happily wolf them down,unaware of the risks. Maybe, there should be notices for Lao people at the border crossings reading?: "You buy Thai seafood at your own risk and Thailand will take no responsibility for any cholera or other contamination of these products outside its own borders (and even then we're not too bothered so long as someone's making money from the deal)"