Pesticide detected in all survivors of Taitung food poisoning incident

Taipei, Sept. 24 (CNA) The final test results of a food poisoning incident that killed three and hospitalized nine in Taitung County last week found toxic pesticide traces in samples from all but one of the victims, Taiwan's Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said on Tuesday.

Terbufos, a hazardous chemical compound found in some pesticides, was detected in all nine patients who had been hospitalized as well as in the bodies of two of the dead victims, the CDC confirmed.

The body of the other person believed to have died in the same food poisoning incident had not been tested since potential samples were not preserved, according to the CDC.

Various authorities have been investigating the incident that began on Sept. 17 when an 83-year-old woman identified by her surname Tseng (曾) died after eating millet dumplings she had made.

The same evening, around 30 relatives and friends gathered at Tseng's home in Binmao Village, a sub-division of Jinfeng Township, to mourn her death, during which time the leftover dumplings from the deceased's kitchen were served.

Two of the mourners died and nine were hospitalized in the early hours of the next day, with doctors at Taitung Mackay Memorial Hospital suspecting neurotoxin poisoning to have caused the outbreak.

Investigators initially suspected that snail meat in the millet dumplings may have contained pesticides, but rapid screening tests conducted by the Taiwan Food and Drug Administration (TFDA) on Sept. 19 did not find abnormalities in snail meat samples taken from Tseng's kitchen.

However, the TFDA tests did detect terbufos, a chemical compound found in some pesticides that can potentially kill humans, in "food waste" samples from the millet dumplings.

TFDA Deputy Director-General Lin Chin-fu (林金富) said that a 60-kilogram adult could die after consuming around 96 milligrams of terbufos, a highly toxic organophosphate insecticide that can cause symptoms such as eye miosis (i.e., constricted pupils), excessive salivation, vomiting, garlic-like bad breath and coma.

The TFDA later ruled out accidental poisoning caused by pesticide residues, with Lin telling reporters on Saturday that the food poisoning was "not a result of ordinary agricultural practices."

The next day, the Taiwan Taitung District Prosecutors Office said they were investigating the source of millet and the preparation process of the deadly dumplings, after detecting up to 1,323 milligrams per kilogram of terbufos in a mortar found in Tseng's home.

At a routine press conference on Tuesday, CDC spokesperson Lo Yi-chun (羅一鈞) explained that terbufos was detected in the blood or urine of all 11 tested individuals and that the results had been confirmed by forensic experts at National Taiwan University and Taipei Veterans General Hospital.

The spokesperson said that two of the survivors of the poisoning incident are still in hospital, while the other seven have already been released.