This winter, our friend Ronna Benjamin who is the wife of the Salty Dawg Sailing Association’s president Michael Benjamin, ate ashore at a good restaurant in the USVI, where they were cruising, and chose to order the fish of the day. We caught up with Mike and Ronna at the Ocean Cruising Club’s annual meeting a couple of weeks ago where Mike was the keynote speaker.
It turned out the fish Ronna ordered, a red hind, was carrying ciguatera and she came down with a fairly serious case of this reef-fish-borne disease. The symptoms are terrible stomach maladies, tingling in the fingers, full body shimmering and numbness around the mouth. It is a serious disease and, two months later, Ronna is recovering but still dealing with lingering symptoms.
Having cruised the Caribbean, South Pacific, Australia and Southeast Asia, all waters with reefs, reef fish and ciguatera, we have known several people to fall prey to it. Luckily, none of these sufferers died. But, one, in the Tuamotus, was so sick he needed an Epi-Pen shot of epinephrine to overcome the anaphylaxis that was shutting down his lungs. It all ended well, but the symptoms lingered on for months.
Veteran cruiser and author Carolyn Shearlock wrote an informative article on the risks of ciguatera for her blog. Noonsite picked it up this week. And now we are linking to it for your benefit. Ciguatera has gone viral. It is well worth getting up to speed on this tropical risk.
