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Subscribe to RSSTwo residents of an elderly care home in California died and four other people were hospitalized after eating soup containing poisonous wild mushrooms picked by a caregiver, the Sacramento Bee reported.
Placer County sheriff's Lt. Mark Reed said the incident, reported Friday morning at the Gold Age Villa in Loomis, was believed to be an accident, the Bee reported. Reed said the dead were identified as Barbara Lopes, 86, and Teresa Olesniewicz, 73. The caregiver was among the four who were hospitalized, the Bee report said.
The Bee said the type of mushroom was not known.
However, Dr. Todd Mitchell, a Santa Cruz, Calif., doctor who is investigating an antidote to toxic mushroom poisoning, told NBC News that he is consulting on treatment of one of the patients sickened by amatoxin poison. A common cause of that poisoning is the Amanita phalloides -- death cap -- mushroom, which produces amatoxins that shut down liver function.
The woman, who is in her 90s, is being treated with the so-called "Santa Cruz protocol" that includes use of the investigational drug Legalon, an intravenous form of silibinin, which is the extract of seeds from the milk-thistle plant.
The treatment started Friday night, so it's still too early to tell how the woman, who was not identified, will fare, Mitchell said. However, dozens of patients treated with the milk-thistle drug and a protocol that emphasizes aggressive hydration typically have improved within 48 hours, he said.
Nearly 6,000 people reported contact with suspicious mushrooms in 2010, and more than 1,300 people got sick, according to latest figures from the American Association of Poison Control Centers. Some 500 people suffered moderate to major injuries and at least one person died.
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I don't care if stupid people want to eat and die from eating death cap mushrooms, but if you feed it to others then this is negligent manslaughter.
Once I was hiking on a mountain side and around me were mushroom pickers. Listening to them there was no doubt whatsoever they didn't know what they were doing. Jeesh!
If the mushroom doesn't carry the union label then don't eat it, that is what I say!
There are some good edible and safe mushrooms in the wild, but you had better know which are which. I gather wild ones but ONLY puffballs, morrels, corals, and hen of the woods. I know these four very well. I don't know the others well enough to take a chance. These four are very easy to identify even for a beginner. They are unmistakeable from any others. Some species are very good but have deadly counterparts. The trumpeter and jack-o-lanter are nearly identical. One is superb, the other is deadly. The same goes for the bolettes and algarics. If you want to harvest some, at least go to a library or dept of conservation and get a book identifying the different species in your area and DON"T take chances. It only takes ONE piece of an amonita the size of your thumbnail to kill you.
I find the safest place to pick mushrooms is in the produce section at the grocery store. Pretty much can't go wrong there...
It is absurd in the highest degree to eat mushrooms whose provenance you don't know. If someone hands you an unattested mushroom, throw it out!!! I'm sure the woman involved in this didn't mean to kill people off but she was profoundly stupid in cooking them and feeding them to herself and others. I hope it's an object lesson. If you don't have a naturalist with you, don't collect fungi.
I had a friend once take wild mushrooms from one of his friends and he ended up having severe stomach pain all night... Even if I had friends like this I wouldn't take anything from them.
I'll bet the caregiver was illegal, it seems to be one of those jobs American's won't do. I hope if it's the case she goes to jail before she's deported. There are millions of homes in California that have been converted to Caregiver facilities. I doubt California has the money to inspect or even know where a lot of them are. I lived next door to one for a while and it was sad to see how badly the residence where treated. I called the city on a number of occasions, one day the temperature was down in the 40's in Southern California and the worker had the bathroom window open while drying off a lady that must have been in her 80's I could hear the worker telling her to stop shaking. I told the worker to close the damn window. Stupid workers don't care about the elderly they are there for a job and would rather be smoking the patients dope. Yep, caregivers can get high off of the patients marijuana, they claim it's from being in the same room while the patient is smoking it. They seem to get a lot more visitors now they've started with this medical marijuana crap.
On the east coast, I used to pick and eat about a dozen different species of mushrooms. It's quite safe if you know what you're doing, and follow the "rules": pick the entire mushroom, note the substrate it's growing on, do a spore print, etc. Chances are good the picker in this instance is a foreign national. Foreigners often pick mushrooms here based on appearance and on what they're accustomed to picking in their own countries. This leads to misidentification (due to the "look-alike" nature of many mushroom species) and to episodes such as this.
How cool how all of you know why the person picked them and all the motives. Did you notice the caregiver who picked them was one of the ones taken to the hospital? Perhaps the caregiver was illegal and perhaps not, but we don't know. Rich relative? Wow...amazing once again how people make up stuff when they don't have information.
What an asinine thing to say. Many care givers are white U.S. citizens. They often work for very little with no benefits and ones I've talked to love their jobs.
No, I'd say this is rather the exception than the rule.
That's exactly it, if a person is picking mushrooms they need to know them well. I know two of these varieties and would trust myself to pick them. I've eaten wild mushrooms picked by others who also knew well what they were picking but wouldn't trust myself enough to know I was getting the same thing they were.
Isn't "Do not eat wild mushrooms" one of those rules they teach you as a kid? Its right up there with "Do not eat wild berries" and "Do not take candy from strangers in white vans"
I grow them on logs and eat wild mushrooms all the time, done that since I was a kid. But you definitely have to know what you are picking. Some shrooms look very much alike but have vastly different constitution.
Look up silymarin, or milk thistle, one of the only things in the German pharmacopaea that reduces toxic effects on the liver.
I know a micologist (with a Masters degree in fungi) who will not pick wild mushrooms, because in America, many of the poison species look almost like the non-poison. Some look exactly the same, and you can't tell unless you test them.
A co-worker of mine collapsed one day due to a seizure. She was an immigrant from Russia, and she used to go pick wild mushrooms in her lunch hour. I had said it wasn't a good idea in North America, but she picked them and ate them anyway.
1.8 deleted, Woof the dog regretting they weren't on the menu at the White House. The most oblique of deathwishes, but still: Banned, rereg of zipperthecat. Rereg of Multiple Hills Hobo also banned.
1.4, 24 deleted, Abu Bob and John Smot with derails about 'Death Panels' and Nancy Pelosi, respectively. Garbage. Post on-topic. You're each suspended for a day for violating #5 of the Code of Honor.
10 years for each death minimum. What a idiot "caregiver", people have no brains today.
I hope they hand out equally stiff penalties to those who give elderly the wrong medication, causing their death. Thousands die like that every year without making much news.
Uhhh. One is a little more negligent than the other- making a horrible, but honest, mistake about medication or dosage is a little different than betting the lives of half a dozen people on your mushroom identification skills.
@William - yep, if you don't know what you are doing, then you shouldn't be doing it.
Like knowing how to properly reply to a comment.
But the mushrooms were natural, and we are endlessly told that natural things are safe.
Human excrement is 'natural' but you don't eat that. At least I don't.
Oh Joan that was funny almost choke on my chips...
@Joan
Not yet, anyway.
We can filter out pee and able to drink it, so you can expect the same thing with wastes.
dgal--are those natural chips?
Actually organic and natural ingredients are the labels placed on items sold, and no one has ever claimed anywhere all natural items are healthy. Only that a specific product has been organically grown. The term natural is unregulated and can be stuck on anything being sold whether edible or not.
People can appreciate that from mankind's beginnings he has lived off the land. We have only recently turned to depending upon others to prepare and supply us with the foods we need as our country has become an industrialized nation. While it has helped to provide more abundance and variety, it has meant the introduction of chemicals and processes needed to ensure products are preserved and could be mass produced. It also means we lose the optimum health benefits,
Many people continue to grow their own foods for those reasons, and still harvest some food sources grown wild. With knowledge passed down or learned it can be a safe option, just as it has been for thousands of years to our ancestors. Who needed it to survive. But since it is optional now, it is critical people know what they are doing. It is people trying to "go back to nature" without realizing the dangers inherent who often get in trouble. Especially if they are going to be taking in mushrooms.There is also the myth, if you see an animal eating it, it must be safe. You cannot know if afterward it dies in another location beyond your view.
In the case of this facility, they absolutely should not have been picking wild mushrooms to serve to others under their guardianship and responsibility. It would have been an easy matter to purchase commercially grown ones to make a soup with. I hope those still ill recover and this serves as a wake up call to others interested in picking wild mushrooms.It is not an area for amateurs.Certainly never to be used by those in a business caring for others.
The Ebola virus is natural but you don't want to catch it.
Most fast food is unnatural...so go figure. I tend to stick to canned goods nowadays, bread, fresh veggies, and the occasional fish.
Q. Why do vegetables like to hang around with a mushroom?
A. Because he's a fungi.
Kleenex and Depends thanks you profusely for your increased demand in the wake of the Conservative right wing NUT debacle. Let me make that easier for simpleton Republicans to understand: YOU LOSE! Your pathetic party of narrow minded, pea brained LOSERS is obsolete.
Republicans: the embodiment of STUPID!
Natural things? Right. Like Rocks, Ocean water, crude oil, Mercury, uranium and unending numbers of other "natural" dangerous or toxic substances?
Why does it seem like the more advanced our society (supposedly) becomes, the lower the IQ's go?
@jimee johnson: I'm not sure if you are describing republicans or yourself. It seems pretty ridiculous to label an entire party of people as narrow-minded and pea-brained. I know those republicans that you are talking about (ie: most of the party leaders) and I can't stand them either, but seriously, most republican people are just normal, every day, hard-working Americans that differ very little from the average joe-blow democrat. (and yes, I voted democrat in this election though I am officially an independent).
It is time for the name calling and incivility to stop. It's what I hate about politics. Just stop. Grow the hell up and act like adults. If we can't work together do you actually expect our leaders to do any better?
If the dog wants to act like an animal, let it. You don't have to stoop to the same level to prove your point. He made the argument for you with his own words.
nanahearn said:
"Why does it seem like the more advanced our society (supposedly) becomes, the lower the IQ's go?"
I totally agree.
(BTW-There's no apostrophe before the "s" for the plural of I.Q.)
Joan....some use excrement as fertilizer. Vegetables eat the fertilizer and you eat the vegetables. All those workers in the fields; where do you think they potty?
I sure think Nicholas was joking. Because I had the same comment in my mind. So many folks subscribe to the logic "if it's natural, it's okay." These are 100% natural untouched by Food, Inc. and they were much more harmful.
Me & my wife had 2 PCH's for 26 yrs. it's against the rules to feed clients anything that is not USDA inspected, not even homegrown vegtables. This place is in a heap of trouble. I hope they had good insurance for the families sake.
Probably a hippy just picked the mushrooms, she probably didn't mean any malice. Makes sense the death cap isn't native to America but does grow in Northern California, it was imported and has since taken root there. It also grows in Rochester NY and areas of NJ. An idiot but probably not a criminal...
Most drunk drivers don't feel malice towards the people they kill. Intent does not mitigate guilt.
Involuntary manslaughter
Involuntary manslaughter is the unlawful killing of a human being without malice aforethought, either express or implied. It is distinguished from voluntary manslaughter by the absence of intention. It is normally divided into two categories; constructive manslaughter and criminally negligent manslaughter, both of which involve criminal liability.
Good point of view Skup I'm sure they didn't mean to feed their patients poison mushrooms, but they are still just as liable for these people lives.
While this is true, there are Other Amanita's that are Native and have similar results as the Death Cap...Native to North America is the Avenging Angel....I Once stopped in a Rest Area in Montana around dinner time and a transient was camped down along the stream...he had just picked what he called Puffballs and he was going to have them for dinner....I asked to see one, cut it open and showed him where gills were beginning to form...This was the button stage avenging Angel....Had he had them for dinner he would have been dead before Tea Time!!
I have studied Mycology and Picked Wild Mushrooms most of my life and I still do not know 1 /100th of what a Botonist who specializes does, and they do not know 1/10th of the Shrooms out there in the wild...You can pick safely if you follow the rules..If you do not, trust me when i say Mushroom poisoning can be an Ugly death to an extremely ugly death depending on the variety you mistake for an edible...If you are unsure, toss it... Learn to do Spore identification and you will stay safe.
Todd's answer is about the safest. There are hundreds of mushroom species, and not even the "experts" know all of them. Stay safe and don't pick them yourself without training.
I mentioned silymarin (in Latin) or milk thistle not as a complete antidote, but as one of the only things that might help a little in a mushroom poisoning, but the best medicine is to avoid the problem in the first place.
Why a hippy, my neighbors pick mushrooms all the time NON are hippies. Most of the people that I know pick mushrooms because its free food. Yes they do know what they are doing but even a professional can make a mistake.
You are going to find more and more people doing this as the cost of living is becoming unafordable for lots of people.
Also ever have a fresh morrel or chantrelle ? there is nothing like them , they are so tasty.
Perhaps they should post a picture of the mushroom, to reduce the likelihood of others making the same mistake.
Forget the pics. Just shop at your local grocer. Problem solved forever!
I dunno about that. Bought a fresh lettuce head once and cut it open and there were small bugs inside of it. Who knows who is inspecting this stuff.
True, Sg, but I can pick bugs out...can't make a poisonous mushroom not poisonous.
The bugs are just a little natural protein.
How does one get "injured" by eating poisonous mushrooms? One can possibly become ill or die, but "injured"...really? Oh, that's right! This was written by the infamous NBC News staff. The third graders who normally do the writing must be off for the holiday weekend.
I noticed that too. It sounded pretty stupid.
The definition of injured is harm of any kind. Look it up. You can be injured from a knife stabbing, and you can be injured from taking a poisonous substance. Something can even injure someone emotionally.
It appears you are not qualified to even write for NBC News. ;P
Permanent liver and/or kidney damage is an injury the same way drinking lye can cause an injury. The illness from the mushroom can go away, but the damage can be permanent. Not sure what NBC staff has to do with your ignorance in this case.
hmmm-1083624
Prometheus Bound. Ancient story about the god who gave fire to humans. He was chained to a rock where everyday horrible birds would eat out his liver, every night it grew back. His penalty for being nice to humans.
However, it does include the ancient knowledge that the liver, of all organs in the body, is the only one to grow "back" (not counting skin which some count?). However kidneys do not grow back, the damage is not able to be regressed - done is done.
Stupid is stupid too.
It was a cut and paste from an article back in May.
http://vitals.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/05/20/11758793-tempting-but-toxic-mushrooms-drug-promises-new-cure?lite
Liver damage is not undone. The liver can "grow back" in some cases, but not in others, and poisoning is one case where there can be permanent damage. If you live in a rich country, you might be able to go on dialysis if the kidneys fail, but the liver is very hard to replace, although there are treatments that have improved in the last ten years.
Injury means just that: if you break a bone, it is injured, damaged, and it might heal and might not. Bones usually heal. Liver damage is not like an illness that you just "get over," but something that causes problems itself. The reason that mushrooms are poison is that they shut down the liver, and then all the other proteins that the liver usually changes and filters are not changed or filtered.
ummmm, yeah... You would think this would be common knowledge.
I'm going back to talkin' to my kat.. At least he makes sense..
I've been taught from infancy not to eat wild mushrooms. I know many are "safe," but why chance it? They really aren't that expensive to buy. I do know which ones in the wild are safe, for the most part, but I really like the idea of living to see another day, too.
I hope those that are ill recover quickly. Now, I must discuss this with my cats, as well.
Don't the have a grocery store there?
Hee, hee ,hee. I was around for the "wild" mushrooms in the 60's. They just sent you on a trip but ususally didn't kill you. Makes me leary about nursing homes, not that there was anything to worry about them in the first place. {: This "caregiver" should be buried under the jail!
Dear Pixpen,
The 1960's may have gone into the "mists of forgetfulness", but those mushrooms? In California? The Legend continues!
I never did like them mushrooms from our youth, give me the peyote buttons anyday back then. :o)
pixpen said:
"Hee, hee ,hee. I was around for the "wild" mushrooms in the 60's. They just sent you on a trip but ususally didn't kill you. Makes me leary about nursing homes...
Does it make Timothy Leary?
I'm sorry and offer my condolences to the families but as I read about these people being" injuried" all I could think of were people being attacked by crazy wild mushrooms. Someone needs to take a course about critical writing and then people like me won't be seeing in their mind these mutant teenage ninja mushrooms attacking people.
My "antidote" (dare I say "cure") for dumb writers. An old Webster's Dictionary, copywrite older than 1960 - and forced to read a page a day. Tests will be forthcoming! LOL
From Merriam-Webster:
Maybe you should break out the dictionary every once in a while, yeah?
Where in the definition is "deadly poison"?
The better question is: where in the definition is it not?
And if you think of the poison mushrooms as ninjas it might help too. They damage (injure) the liver. Ninjas were trained assassins that were peasants, and when they were not carrying out an assassination, they would disguise themselves as simple farmers.
Its common knowledge that many varieties of wild mushrooms are poisonous. Who doesnt know that? Its a shame.
Many are also very tasty. I am a chef and have picked and eaten many types of mushrooms. Those who do not know that should not be feeding them to others. If you like mushrooms please learn about them before you go hunting for them.
My husband is a doctor and I can tell you people die or have liver failure from doing this.
Please people, use your brain, DO NOT EAT WILD MUSHROOMS.
OMFG
Offensive and crude. That desperate to come up with new acronym??
Maybe, carpet bomb our enemies with poison mushroom spores.
Let's see. I'll weigh the risk. On one hand I could save $2.99 by picking mushrooms myself but on the other hand myself and others may die if I do. In the past, I've read about others dying because of eating wild mushrooms they picked and ate. Hmmmm.... What should I do? What should I do? It's so sad that people just don't think before thay act.
Well, you do not go into the woods to forage for Agaricus bisporus (your regular Walmart champignon mushroom). You should also never forage for Agaricus campestris since you don't really get any special treat with it and it can be easly mistaken for deadly Amanitas.
If you go into the woods you do it to find something like Boletus edulis Bull - the king of mushroom. First a fully grown specimen cannot be mistaken for anything else, second, it is a rather expensive treat should you find a restaurant that serves a Boletus soup or meat sauce.
Yes, people here tell me to buy mushrooms at my local grocery store. But the thing is I can't find Boletus edulis there, or many other excellent edible species. I personally do not pick wild mushrooms because there is a risk, but it's not rocket science either. When I was a kid I could easily recognize Cantharellus cibarius. Yummy. Rule #1 I learned, if it has "blades" it's very likely not good, if it has "sponge" it's probably good. There are exceptions, of course.
Well, it may not be rocket science, but it's not simple and safe unless you are an expert. So if you choose to go pick and eat that is up to you. But many don't know enough to be safe, and buying from the grocery store is a great option for most.
Art-886348, I just Googled 'where to buy Boletus edulis' and Amazon sells them. . I also noticed you can buy the spores as well. There were other leads as well. Much safer to search the internet than searching the woods. Just a thought. Again hard to believe someone would risk lives in order to save a few bucks.
I pick morels every spring and chanterelles every fall. Wild chanterelles this year were selling at 19 dollars a pound locally. Stores buy from local pickers so these "wild" mushrooms are also sold in stores.
Boletus Edulis is sold as Porcini, usually dried.
Harvesting wild mushrooms is a nice hobby and there are several species of mushroom that are highly sought after for their great taste and incredible aroma.
Boletus edulis Bull., Cantharellus cibarius Fr. and Suillus Gray are among best tasting mushrooms out there. There are multiple other species of edible mushrooms; however some of them can be easily mistaken
for the very deadly poisonous ones if a person does not have necessary knowledge and experience.
It takes some serious studying and a few years under a supervision of an experienced forager to not get yourself, or others killed. And ultimately, if any mushroom cannot be easily identified: just leave it alone...
Always assume given specimen to be toxic, if you are not absolutely certain what you are looking at…
We have our stand of morels, but they are only available for a short time in the spring here in Michigan. I'm not sure about any other state--or any other mushroom--so morels are the only ones we pick.
I had a neighbor tell me that mushrooms that grow in the woods aren't dangerous. I made a note never to have dinner at his house!
The most beautiful mushroom I ever saw was growing in the woods. It was pure white. I was studying plant communities at the time, and I knew it was the Destroying Angel. That one will kill you unless you get really fast treatment, and sometimes it kills you anyway.
The only oberservation I would make, as a long time mushroom hunter is that "There are old mushroom hunters and there are bold mushroom hunters, but their are few old bold mushroom hunters."
I had a toadstool in my back yard last year.
Dear Judd-2749800, Wonderful! That is the extent of my botany for the day too! Watching it, not eating it.
Live? or die. Inbetween is toxic illness.
How about they do not invent a cure for eating the toxic mushrooms? If they do that, the dummies will eat them all the time and the rate of death will go off the charts?
An antidote? Is that what they are talking about? Yes. That would be nice, but not a "cure"?????? LOL
I admire those who have the guts to go into the wild, pick up a mushroom, decide to live or die about it and keep taking them home. Bold? old?
It is like playing Russian roulette everytime you want to eat?
I like Campbell's Mushroom Soup - the extent of my gourmet tastes for mushrooms!
Well since NBCNEWS.COM only tends to report half stories, but yet most are ready to prosecute the caregiver, it is to bad that 2 have died do to this issue.
What does your post even mean? How do you know there were other details available to report? If the caregiver picked them and added them to the soup, how wouldn't she be responsible at least in part?
A little two to too confusing; an explanation is due.
what makes the caregiver a "expert" in mushrooms? i doubt she was , and i really doubt she did iton purpose, but still stupid people exist, and think they know more than they really do or willever know, there is a place called a grocery store, they sell mushrooms that are not poisonious, if you are too cheap to go to the store then dont pick your own mushrooms, like this one idiot who was too cheap to buy his own tea and thought oleander tea if h e picked himself and dried it and he would save a few bucks,well he cost his family over 10 grand for his funeral, another cheapo dead, unless you grow your own food and know what you are looking at ,,, go to the damn grocery store,death isnt all it is crackedup to be,i write this from the great beyound,some fool gaveme death cap mushrooms on my salad, i died and it isnt any fun,really hot here,still waiting for my permit to sell ice cubes
Oleander is deadly. A lot of plants are deadly. Beware also of some plants that pets will chew on: no lilies for example. People put out displays of plants at the holidays; be sure that pets or toddlers won't chew on them. Please use only plastic mistletoe for decoration.
Too many people are stubborn, mistaking that for "freedom" and "independence." There is no right in America to kill somebody else, not even by mistake or ignorance. They think they know better than the law, science, and that the courts are just too busy to catch them or prosecute.
I would be very surprised if she is set free (if she recovers).
Sad .
Some mushrooms can kill but many others just make you wish you'd die.
Some mushrooms can kill but many others just make you wish you'd die.
That's a political statement if I ever saw one.
Go look for some more toadstools.
I am sorry for the loss of two of the women. The other two survivors need to have somebody play the "Fibber Magee and Molly" episode about wild mushrooms. I was quite funny. They can be found online.