WHO: 400 Angolans Sick From Bromide Poisoning
Pastor Dale Morgan
WHO: 400 Angolans Sick From Bromide Poisoning*
AP
GENEVA - Nearly 400 people _ mostly children _ have fallen ill in Angola
in what medical investigators suspect is an outbreak of bromide
poisoning, the World Health Organization said Thursday.
The first cases were identified in October, the agency said. The
patients, more than half of them children under age 15, are being
treated at a hospital in Cacuaco, in Angola's north, it said.
WHO said it found "extremely high levels of bromide" among the patients.
The chemical is commonly used in Angola's oil industry, but WHO
officials said they were not sure how the patients were exposed.
"We are still in the preliminary stages of investigating this outbreak
and have a lot of unanswered questions," said Peter Ben Embarek, a WHO
food safety expert.
"The problem is that sodium bromide doesn't smell of anything and it
looks like salt, so it would be very easy to confuse it with something
else," Ben Embarek said.
Bromide, a chemical compound found in some forms naturally, such as sea
water, can be toxic in other forms leading to severe poisoning.
WHO and Angolan health experts suspect the cause is toxicological
because symptoms include extreme drowsiness and an inability to walk
unaided.
Ben Embarek said that patients were being treated with salt solutions to
help remove the bromide from their bodies.
Health officials are still receiving a steady stream of new cases _
seven more people were reported sick on Thursday. WHO has also sent a
team of experts including doctors, epidemiologists and lab experts to
Angola to help contain the outbreak.