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Bad news made worse
Oct. 20th, 2009 05:55 pm2 Newton residents hospitalized after eating "Death Angel" mushrooms
Tragically, a woman who apparently frequently collected and ate wild mushrooms, collected some of the deadliest mushrooms on earth and cooked them up for herself and her son. They are hospitalized in critical condition. Mushrooms in the Amanita group contain toxins that disable the kidneys and liver. They don't taste bad, in fact victims of this kind of mushroom poisoning often eat a large amount of the mushrooms in a delicious but deadly meal. Amanita mushrooms usually have a large, thin ring hanging from the top of the stalk, and the base of the stalk is swollen and bulb-like. I tell people in my mushroom classes to never eat mushrooms with these characteristics (I actually don't advocate that anyone in my classes eat any gilled mushrooms at all, since these are so hard to distinguish from one another.
But this news story included some language that verged on the hysterical (as in, inspired by hysteria, not ha-ha hysterical): “Wild mushrooms should not be eaten,” said the mayor of Newton. “You can’t eliminate mushrooms,” the City Health Commissioner said. “The best response is to be alerted to them and to not be tempted to eat them." Senior Environmental Health Specialist John McNally said “Some are so poisonous that getting the residue on your hands is taking a chance,”
He recommended using gloves to pull out mushrooms in yards and disposing of them in double plastic bags.
Also in my classes I clear up the question of handling mushrooms: there are no mushrooms in New England that can hurt you if you touch them. If you mash up an Amanita into a paste with your hands, yeah, you might be risking getting toxins in your hangnails. I recommend that after handling wild mushrooms you wash your hands--after all, your hands will be dirty if you are doing it right. You have to dig the stalk out of the dirt to positively identify an Amanita. Probably the victim in this sad case cut the mushrooms with a knife, and didn't have all the features she needed to make a proper identification. That sucks, and I hope she and her son get better. The tragic nature of the case doesn't excuse trying to scare everyone about the creeping fungal menace in their back yard. Here's my comment on the website:
While this accidental poisoning is tragic, and I hope these people get better, I object to the tone of fear-mongering that overwhelms this story. “Wild mushrooms should not be eaten" is an opinion of many people in Britain and the United States, but in the rest of the world the practice of learning edible fungi and making use of them is quite normal. "You can’t eliminate mushrooms," and thank God for that, since fungi are essential to the continuation of forest ecosystems and cycle of growth and regeneration in all natural systems. There are far more species of poisonous plants than poisonous mushrooms but no sane person would advocate removing all the plants from their yard. What this incident points to more than anything else is the need for more people to understand the nature around them, not the need to eliminate certain kinds of life forms because we fear them. I wish the mother and son a swift recovery, Amanita poisoning is very serious. Also I hope that this news story hasn't made worse the notion that nature is something to be feared, and altered to suit our fears.
Tragically, a woman who apparently frequently collected and ate wild mushrooms, collected some of the deadliest mushrooms on earth and cooked them up for herself and her son. They are hospitalized in critical condition. Mushrooms in the Amanita group contain toxins that disable the kidneys and liver. They don't taste bad, in fact victims of this kind of mushroom poisoning often eat a large amount of the mushrooms in a delicious but deadly meal. Amanita mushrooms usually have a large, thin ring hanging from the top of the stalk, and the base of the stalk is swollen and bulb-like. I tell people in my mushroom classes to never eat mushrooms with these characteristics (I actually don't advocate that anyone in my classes eat any gilled mushrooms at all, since these are so hard to distinguish from one another.
But this news story included some language that verged on the hysterical (as in, inspired by hysteria, not ha-ha hysterical): “Wild mushrooms should not be eaten,” said the mayor of Newton. “You can’t eliminate mushrooms,” the City Health Commissioner said. “The best response is to be alerted to them and to not be tempted to eat them." Senior Environmental Health Specialist John McNally said “Some are so poisonous that getting the residue on your hands is taking a chance,”
He recommended using gloves to pull out mushrooms in yards and disposing of them in double plastic bags.
Also in my classes I clear up the question of handling mushrooms: there are no mushrooms in New England that can hurt you if you touch them. If you mash up an Amanita into a paste with your hands, yeah, you might be risking getting toxins in your hangnails. I recommend that after handling wild mushrooms you wash your hands--after all, your hands will be dirty if you are doing it right. You have to dig the stalk out of the dirt to positively identify an Amanita. Probably the victim in this sad case cut the mushrooms with a knife, and didn't have all the features she needed to make a proper identification. That sucks, and I hope she and her son get better. The tragic nature of the case doesn't excuse trying to scare everyone about the creeping fungal menace in their back yard. Here's my comment on the website:
While this accidental poisoning is tragic, and I hope these people get better, I object to the tone of fear-mongering that overwhelms this story. “Wild mushrooms should not be eaten" is an opinion of many people in Britain and the United States, but in the rest of the world the practice of learning edible fungi and making use of them is quite normal. "You can’t eliminate mushrooms," and thank God for that, since fungi are essential to the continuation of forest ecosystems and cycle of growth and regeneration in all natural systems. There are far more species of poisonous plants than poisonous mushrooms but no sane person would advocate removing all the plants from their yard. What this incident points to more than anything else is the need for more people to understand the nature around them, not the need to eliminate certain kinds of life forms because we fear them. I wish the mother and son a swift recovery, Amanita poisoning is very serious. Also I hope that this news story hasn't made worse the notion that nature is something to be feared, and altered to suit our fears.
