If the fruit is moldy, can I still eat it after removing the moldy part?

Do you know what mycotoxins are?

How does it enter the human body?

Eating food containing mycotoxins

Is it necessarily harmful to the human body?

Don't worry,

Let us answer them one by one today

These problems.

What are mycotoxins?

In warm and humid seasons, food is prone to mold, and the culprit is "mold". When mold carries toxin-producing genes and the environmental conditions are suitable, it will produce "mycotoxins". Mold is a type of fungus, and the toxins produced by mold are called mycotoxins.

There are more than 400 known mycotoxins, which can contaminate almost all crops! Common mycotoxins include: aflatoxin, deoxynivalenol, patulin, ochratoxin A, zearalenone, etc.

Ingestion of food contaminated with fungal toxins can cause food poisoning symptoms such as nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain and allergies. Long-term chronic intake may also cause cancer and teratogenic hazards.

How do fungal toxins enter the human body?

Direct route : eating grains, fruits, juices and other foods contaminated with fungal toxins.

Indirect pathway : Feeding animals with feed contaminated with mycotoxins will eventually cause harm to human health through the food chain.

For example : ochratoxin can accumulate in animals; aflatoxin B1 is metabolized into aflatoxin M1 in dairy cows, contaminating milk.

In the hot and rainy season, grains, vegetables and fruits grow vigorously and have abundant yields. Storage after harvest is particularly important. People also store a lot of fruits at home to relieve the heat. However, if the fruits are not stored properly and become moldy, and people think that it is okay and continue to eat them, they may ingest fungal toxins.

It seems that the moldy parts are definitely not edible. So is it okay to dig out the rotten parts and only eat the intact parts?

No! Because the scope of mold contamination far exceeds the "mold" and "hair" that we can see with the naked eye: mold hyphae not only exist on the surface of the fruit, but have also invaded the inside of the fruit, and the fungal toxins they produce also spread from the moldy part to the non-moldy part.

Next, we will introduce to you the "invisible killer" in food - fungal toxins through an animation. Everyone should pay more attention to it in daily life!

If summer fruits are only slightly rotten, should we throw them away or cut off the rotten parts and continue to eat them?

In fact, fungal hyphae and the toxins they produce can spread in the flesh of rotten fruit, so once the fruit is rotten, even the seemingly intact parts may contain many times more fungi than fresh fruit.

Patulin is a common fungal toxin in fruits that can damage the intestines, impair kidney function and may even cause cancer. It is extremely heat-resistant and it is difficult to destroy or reduce its toxicity even by high-temperature cooking.

In our daily lives, we should try our best to purchase according to our needs and store food in a dry, low-temperature environment.

If you find that food is moldy, you should throw it away immediately and not eat it anymore. Stay away from fungal toxins, the "invisible killer" in food!