Is Food Poison Bothering you this Summer

The hot temperature in this summer is hitting all of us, it becomes a torture to go out or to select a dress to wear or doing any works and even eating food becomes difficult. Due to this heatness or humidity or hot waves it causes many diseases such as abdominal pain, vomiting, diarrhoea, cholera, hepatitis, food poison and so on related to digestive tract infection. Apart from heat stroke, migraine, inflammations, lack of sleep also disturbs us.

On the other side of this hot summer many weddings, house warmings, religious functions of temple will be going on and people with excitement end up in eating various varieties of snacks, lunch and other foods. Remember summer has to pass with happy moments and at the same time we need to maintain our health to enjoy these excitements. We should eat as per our digestion capacity and also limit our eating as the health of the abdomen should not be damaged due to the desires of the tongue and mind.

Food poison can be of two ways, one - the toxin produces inside our body due to indigestion and the other - where the virus or the bacteria or the fungus or the poison enters our body through external food.

First - In summer digestion capacity of our body decreases due to the increased hotness of sun rays and dehydration of the body. Also if  our diet is such a way that we keep on eating even when we are not hungry and having cold foods or drinks like soda, ice cream, cold sandwiches, also drinking too much of coffee or tea  and also lifestyle without exercises or over exercises, all these can lead to indigestion inside the intestines. When indigestion happens first it starts with gassy feeling or bloating feeling, then with pain, gastritis, loose motions or vomiting ending with severe dehydration and fever in 3-4 days time or even weeks time. Here in such case antibiotics, IV fluids all will help for few days by subsiding symptoms but still it continues, or reoccurs or tiredness will never end.

In such a time make sure you just take rest for 2 or 3 days and keep drinking liquids every one hour and eat only khichadi, buttermilk rice or rice and ghee for 2 - 3 days. Do not stop vomiting or loose motions with medications, let the intestines get cleared, just aid it with healthy drinks like buttermilk, rice porridge, barley porridge, tender coconut water, herbal water, cumin water, coriander water jaggery water with lemon or tamarind juice, fenugreek buttermilk. Keeping ourselves hydrated with mentioned liquids and eating good summer meals and that also when we feel hungry and avoiding foods like spices, nuts, gravy foods, coffee, tea, cheese, paneer, deep fried foods, rich heavy foods can make our summer healthy and keep away from food poison.

Second - If the food is already spoilt and attacked with fungus or virus or bacteria or  any kind of poison, then it will immediately or within half a day shows difference with severe abdominal pain, head ache, heavy heads, severe loose motions or vomiting even sometimes blood or excessive tiredness. In such a case seek our help and remember do not stop vomiting or diarrhoea and do as mentioned above with lot of liquids and let the affected microbes get away from the body. Make sure you are not tired and keep hydrating.

In this summer help your body by loading less solids and more good liquids in turn it will give you a healthy life.

Lets go into a simple non fire summer drink recipe:

Tamarind Juice

Ingredients required:

Tamarind juice - 2 tsp

Jaggery powder - 2 tsp

Cardamom powder - 1 pinch

Saindava Salt - 1 pinch

Cumin powder - 3 pinch

Peppermint powder - 2 pinch

Water - 150 ml

Method of Preperation:

Take the water in a glass and add the jaggery to it and stir well until it is dissolved. Then add the tamarind juice and add cardamom powder, salt, cumin powder and pepper powder. Stir well and drink this in mid day or evening in this summer to enhance your digestive capacity and to relieve dehydration.

For more details please contact Mahanasa Ayurveda, Bangalore.