A sad story of a young girl’s death in Macau has spread on the internet like wildfire. What happened was the girl started bleeding from several parts on her body and died during the night. According to the autopsy results, her death was due to arsenic poisoning. Then, a more important question arose – how did arsenic get into her body? The autopsy report was further investigated by a professor from a renowned medical school. After autopsying the girl’s stomach, the doctor shed new light on the case. The case was neither suicide, nor homicide.
The cause of death was linked to some dietary habits the girl had. Namely, she had been taking vitamin C supplements and the night before she died, she ate a lot of shrimps. According to earlier research by scientists from the University of Chicago, shrimp as well as soft shell foods contains high amounts of five potassium arsenic compounds. Although this food is not toxic for the body, when combined with vitamin C, it changes its chemical structure and becomes poisoning. To be more specific, it creates chemical reaction in combination with vitamin C converting the original non-toxic five potassium arsenic (i.e. arsenic anhydride, also known as arsenic pentoxide), into a toxic three potassium arsenic (ie arsenic anhydride), also known as arsenic trioxide!
According to health experts, arsenic poisoning can lead to life-threatening issues such as paralysis of capillaries, lobule central necrosis, heart, liver, kidney, intestine congestion, epithelial cell necrosis, and telangiectasia. Arsenic poisoning can also result in bleeding. That’s why you should never eat shrimps when taking vitamin C supplements!
