A New Jersey father died after eating a barbecued hamburger, becoming the first person to die after developing a little-known meat allergy.
On 13 November, a paper was published in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology, introducing readers to an unnamed airline pilot from New Jersey, who had died weeks after first suffering ‘abdominal discomfort’ on a family camping trip.
Four hours after eating a steak at 10pm, his pain became ‘so severe’ that he began ‘having diarrhoea and vomiting’, as per the research.
The man recovered the following day, apparently telling one of his sons that he felt as if he was ‘going to die’ during the episode.
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A mere three weeks later, the dad and his family attended a barbecue, where he ate a hamburger at around 3pm.
The study, conducted by experts from the Department of Medicine at the University of Virginia School of Medicine and Hackensack Meridian Health, explained that around 4.5 hours later, the man was discovered by one of his sons ‘unconscious on the floor of the bathroom with vomit around him’.
“The son called 911 at 7:37 PM and initiated resuscitation,” the paper read. “The paramedics continued resuscitation efforts for 2 hours, which included transferring the patient to hospital, but at 10:22 PM, he was declared dead.”
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An official autopsy concluded that the man had died ‘sudden, unexplained death’, but scientists discovered through testing that he had died from alpha-gal syndrome, a rare tick-borne meat allergy.
The Mayo Clinic explained that a bite from a Lone Star tick can cause you to become allergic to red meat, like beef and pork, and other products that come from mammals, such as dairy items and gelatin.
Symptoms usually start between two and six hours after eating something with the alpha-gal molecule, and can include hives and itching, swelling in the lips, face, throat, or eyelids, shortness of breath, and stomach pain, diarrhoea, nausea, or vomiting.
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According to the University of Virginia’s Health’s Dr. Thomas Platts-Mills, there is no real cure for alpha-gal syndrome; you have to abstain from eating red meat or other products from mammals.
According to the man’s wife, he didn’t actually have any tick bites, but instead exhibited a handful of ‘chigger’ marks around his ankle.
Chiggers are microscopic mites, a close relative to spiders and ticks, that live in warm, grassy, or wooded areas near water that bite your skin and cause extreme itching, the Cleveland Clinic stated.
Treatment includes taking antihistamines or anti-parasite medication and using topical creams or lotion.
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As per the paper, chigger mites are often actually the larvae of Lone Star ticks, which carry the sugar molecule alpha-gal in saliva.
Doctors concluded that, as well as the chigger bites, other factors may have brought about the American man’s death, including having a beer with his burger, exposure to ragweed pollen, and having exercised that afternoon.
In a press release from UVA Health, Dr Platts-Mills stressed that doctors and patients should be aware of the risk Lone Star ticks pose.
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“More specifically, if [a patient has] unexpected episodes of severe abdominal pain occurring several hours after eating mammalian meat, they should be investigated for possible sensitisation to the oligosaccharide alpha-gal,” he explained.
Between 96,000 and 450,000 Americans have been affected by alpha-gal syndrome since 2010, according to data published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
If you have any food allergy symptoms after eating, you should seek medical advice.
However, if you have symptoms of a serious allergic reaction that causes trouble breathing (anaphylaxis), you should get emergency medical treatment as soon as possible.
Ella Scott