Minamata disease: A disorder caused by methyl mercury poisoning that was first described in the inhabitants of Minamata Bay, Japan and resulted from their eating fish contaminated with mercury industrial waste. The disease is characterized by peripheral sensory loss, tremors, dysarthria, ataxia, and both hearing and visual loss.
-Even the unborn child is at risk from Minamata disease. Methyl mercury readily crosses the placenta from mother to fetus and is damaging, particularly to the developing brain. Children born with Minamata disease can have growth deficiency, microcephaly (an abnormally small head), severe mental retardation and be deaf and blind.
-Minamata disease has not been confined to Minamata where the source of the mercury was primarily from eating fish caught in the contaminated Bay. Other sources of maternal exposure to methyl mercury have included flour made from seed grain treated with methyl mercury (which affected at least 6,500 people in Iraq) and meat from animals raised on mercury-tainted grain (in New Mexico, USA)
Finding the Cause
Researchers from Kumamoto University also began to focus on the cause of the strange disease. They found that the victims, often members of the same family, were clustered in fishing hamlets along the shore of Minamata Bay. The staple food of victims was invariably fish and shellfish from Minamata Bay. The cats in the local area, who tended to eat scraps from the family table, had died with symptoms similar to those now discovered in humans. This led the researchers to believe that the outbreak was caused by some kind of food poisoning, with contaminated fish and shellfish the prime suspects.
Water Borne Disease In Malaysia
-The latest reported death from the bacterial disease leptospirosis was Saturday. The 17-year-old boy in northern Kedah state had swam in a river and had a picnic with friends at a recreational park last month, the New Straits Times and The Star reported.
-Several parks throughout the country have been closed since the first deaths were reported last month. Some deaths were believed to have been caused by a separate waterborne disease, and a Health Ministry official could not immediately say how many were caused by leptospirosis.
-The Health Ministry's website warns people not to swim in public rivers when it rains and to avoid taking a dip if they have cuts on their body, which makes an infection more likely.
-Leptospirosis is caused by exposure to water contaminated with urine of infected animals and absorbed through the skin. Rats are the main carriers, and the ministry's campaign urges people not to dump rubbish near water sources that could attract rats, he said.
-Cases of the disease have been increasing in Malaysia. It killed 62 people last year, up from 20 in 2004. In the same period, the number of infections rose more than fivefold to more than 1,400 cases, up from 263.
Symptoms are severe muscle pain, fever, vomiting and headache, and leptospirosis is curable if the person is treated within a week.
Water Borne Disease In Malaysia
-The latest reported death from the bacterial disease leptospirosis was Saturday. The 17-year-old boy in northern Kedah state had swam in a river and had a picnic with friends at a recreational park last month, the New Straits Times and The Star reported.
-Several parks throughout the country have been closed since the first deaths were reported last month. Some deaths were believed to have been caused by a separate waterborne disease, and a Health Ministry official could not immediately say how many were caused by leptospirosis.
-The Health Ministry's website warns people not to swim in public rivers when it rains and to avoid taking a dip if they have cuts on their body, which makes an infection more likely.
-Leptospirosis is caused by exposure to water contaminated with urine of infected animals and absorbed through the skin. Rats are the main carriers, and the ministry's campaign urges people not to dump rubbish near water sources that could attract rats, he said.
-Cases of the disease have been increasing in Malaysia. It killed 62 people last year, up from 20 in 2004. In the same period, the number of infections rose more than fivefold to more than 1,400 cases, up from 263.
Symptoms are severe muscle pain, fever, vomiting and headache, and leptospirosis is curable if the person is treated within a week.
RESOURCE;http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=14083
http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=14083
http://content.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1986457_1986501_1986450,00.htmlhttp://phys.org/news201776576.html
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