Food is what makes travelling worth it and when you travel to a place foreign to you, you cannot help but be excited of trying out the local food. Health experts always advise everyone to eat fish because it has a lot of health benefits but the toxins that are inside contaminated fish causes a lot of problems. 2 of the most common known diseases that are taken from fish-food poisoning are scombroid and ciguatera and for those not familiar of such diseases, travelers are often the ones exposed to these risks.
Fish that are contaminated with the toxins produced by the microorganisms that are living around the coral reefs. The small fish eat these microorganisms and they get eaten by the large ones which has already the toxins concentrated throughout their body. These high concentrations of toxins can be found in the head, eggs, intestines and the liver. Since these fishes are shipped around the world, anyone is open to ciguatera. This disease is commonly taken from eating red snapper, surgeonfish, parrot fish, sturgeon, sea bass, amberjack, moray eel, grouper and barracuda. Its symptoms occur usually after one to three hours after the person has eaten the fish contaminated with it. The symptoms include stomach pain, diarrhea, vomiting and nausea. In other people they may feel some neurologic symptoms such as tooth pain, feeling of teeth getting loose, blurred vision, metallic taste inside the mouth and a tingling sensation.
The bad fact about ciguatera is that there is no treatment for it so at best travelers should avoid eating the kind of fish that are aforementioned above especially the moray eel and barracuda. Avoid eating the organs where the highest concentration of toxins are found. There is no changes to the physical appearance of a fish that are infected with the toxins so there is difficulty telling which fish are affected or not. The toxins that are eaten by these fish are not destroyed by intense heat so even if they are thoroughly cooked, the risk is still present.
Scombroid is a disease caused by a fish that is not thoroughly preserved or refrigerated so this has high levels of histamine. The list of fish that are affected by this include marlin, amberjack, bluefish, herring, anchovies, sardines, mahimahi, mackerel and tuna. The symptoms of this disease is mostly allergic reaction which include heart palpitations, flushed face, headache, diarrhea, cramps, itching and blurred vision. Unlike ciguatera, this can be cured with the intake of antihistamines.