VietNamNet Bridge – The Bach Mai Hospital in Hanoi recently received four additional patients from Tuyen Quang province who were severely poisoned with mushrooms, bringing the total number to 14 people within a week, including two deaths.

The poisonous mushroom.

Dr. Pham Due, Director of the Poison Control Center of the Bach Mai Hospital, said that the four patients in Tuyen Quang are in the same family. They were transferred to the hospital on March 16.

They all ate white mushrooms. As they were shifted to the hospital late, 58 hours after the first poisoning symptoms appeared, they were in very serious conditions, with liver failure.

The 14 patients with mushroom poisoning are divided into three groups. The first group consists of five people from Vo Nhai district of Thai Nguyen province, who were hospitalized on March 9. Of these, two died, including a 13 year old boy and a 60 year old woman.

The second group was hospitalized on March 12, 24 hours after eating mushrooms, including five people from Thai Nguyen.

The third group is four people from Tuyen Quang. All of them ate a species of white mushroom, which looks like normal mushroom but is highly toxic, with slow effects on human.

"Only one of the 14 victims is now out of danger. The others are at very high risk of death. One of them works at the health station of Vo Nhai district, Thai Nguyen province. This patient was trained on poisonous mushroom but after the village elders declared that the mushroom was eatable, he ate it," said Dr. Due.

According to Dr. Due, the center has mobilized all resources to rescue these patients but the fatal risk is very high because the victims ate too much mushrooms, were hospitalized late and the on-the-spot aid was inaccurate.

Le Ha