- Dr. Rachel Buckle-Rashid found the reptile’s head in her packet of green beans
- She had contacted manufacturer Giant Food, but received ‘no real answer’
- READ MORE: Salmonella outbreak linked to melons sickens more than 40 people
An American doctor has taken to Twitter to ask medical colleagues for help after finding a severed ‘snake head’ in her frozen beans.
Dr. Rachel Buckle-Rashid, a pediatrician from Atlanta, Georgia, posted a photo to X on Tuesday evening showing the severed reptile head sitting on a pan of frozen green beans.
The beans, she explained, were purchased from the Giant Food supermarket chain, which has 166 stores across the country.
“What pathogens should I be concerned about if I find a severed snake head in frozen green beans?” she asked.
The tweet resulted in a flood of responses from the medical community, debating how risky it would be to eat the beans — and whether the surprising discovery in her vegetables was indeed a snake.
Dr. Rachel Buckle-Rashid, a pediatrician from Atlanta, Georgia, posted a photo to
Dr. Max Witt, an infectious disease researcher at the University of Colorado, said of X, “If you cook it right, you’ll be fine. Wash your hands after handling raw snake meat (mainly for salmonella).”
Both reptiles and amphibians can carry germs that make humans sick, the most common of which is the bacterial infection. salmonella.
But Dr. Gail Barnes, a scientist who works at the Elgin Public Museum of Natural History & Anthropology in Illinois, said, “Pathogens are the least of your worries with a severed snake head in your greenery.”
‘Don’t try to find more body parts, throw everything away, plus any other similar products you have.
‘If you really want a pathogen list, here’s the summary: everything imaginable!’
According to outdoor publication ActionHub, all snakes in North America are safe to eat.
But it advised caution when eating venomous snakes to avoid eating the head – where the venom is stored – because their venom can get into open wounds in your mouth or throat and enter your bloodstream.
Dr. Buckle-Rashid said she contacted Giant Food but received “no real response.”
Salmonella infects more than 1.3 million people annually, leading to 26,500 hospital admissions and 420 deaths per year.
Symptoms of infection usually occur within 12 hours to three days after eating contaminated food and include diarrhea, fever and abdominal cramps.
In rare cases, a salmonella infection can cause the organism to enter the bloodstream and cause more serious illnesses, such as infections in the arteries, endocarditis (inflammation of the heart valve), and arthritis.