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For those of you who love Padang food, of course you are familiar with the savory, sticky taste of the beef brain curry that shakes the tongue. So, have you ever imagined what the human brain feels like? If you ask Hannibal Lecter, a sadistic cannibal who is fortunately only a fictional character, he might be happy to recommend it for your lunch menu of the day.
But if you're really curious about what the human brain feels like and want a definite answer, just ask the Fore people in Papua New Guinea. In the past, the Fore tribe had a custom to eat the bodies of people who had just died at their funeral. Men eat the meat of the deceased, while women, the elderly, and children share their brains. This tradition of cannibalism is an expression of respect for the deceased during his lifetime.
Unfortunately, this practice actually caused a sad tragedy in Fore society. Of the 11 thousand total population, more than 200 people died from eating human brains. What is the chapter?
What happens if we eat human brains?
If you find the human brain in plain sight (for whatever reason) and have the opportunity to taste it, some sources estimate that you will ingest 78 calories, 10 grams of fat, 11 grams of protein, and 1 gram of carbohydrates for every 100 grams of brain weight. So maybe you can be a little relieved to know that what you eat is quite nutrient dense.
But while it's nutritious, eating the human brain can kill you. That's because the human brain contains strange protein molecules called prions, which cause you to suffer from the terrible degenerative disease called "Kuru". The word "kuru" comes from the local language Fore which means "to die trembling". Kuru belongs to the class of progressive neurodegenerative diseases (TSE), which also includes mad cow disease.
Although prions are naturally produced in all mammalian brains, these proteins can self-transform and thus make them betray the host body - acting like a virus that attacks healthy tissue. Often times this causes deadly damage.
Once you experience Kuru's symptoms for the first time, it will be just a matter of counting the days to meet your death. Initial symptoms include difficulty walking, loss of control over limbs, involuntary, jerky, seizure-like movements, insomnia, confusion, severe headaches, and memory problems. You will gradually lose control of your emotions as well, leading to signs of psychosis, depression and personality changes. Within a year, you can no longer get up and stand from the floor, eat alone, or control all bodily functions. This disease usually leads to death for several months to several years.
Even more creepy, although the cannibalistic customs of the Fore tribe were discontinued more than 50 years ago, new cases of Kuru continued to emerge years after. This is because prions can take decades to show their real effect. It is recorded that the last person to die from Kuru died in 2009, but it was not until the end of 2012 that this terrible epidemic was officially declared extinct.
And according to the researchers, the processes involved in prion-induced disease formation are likely to be responsible for the lethal effects of all kinds of degenerative brain diseases, including Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and dementia. What, do you still want to try eating the human brain?
