How exactly does food poisoning work? How does the body know that the food is contaminated and which way to expel it out? How does it know when things are safe again?
In: 3971
It knows when things are safe because it has just emptied absolutely everything out of any hole in the digestive system that it can find
The symptoms associated with a condition called “food poisoning” like vomiting, diarrhea, and fever are probably something like sneezing where there’s a reflex mechanism built into the nervous system triggered by your immune system’s response. The immune system is constantly active, so it’s not that your body “knows” it’s safe again, really a matter of “when is the stuff causing you to feel sick (an allergen/pathogen/etc.) out of your body?” and “when do you feel well again enough to eat/go outside/etc?”
E.coli and other bacteria are super tiny things that live and grow in food. As they grow and make more bacteria, they produce toxins (toxins are substances that make you sick), some of the toxins get destroyed by cooking, but some are still there even when cooked. When these toxins hit your insides they make your belly upset. Your body doesn’t want you to eat any more toxins, so you can even feel sick just looking at or smelling food.
Looking at some of the other answers I’d like to clarify. Bacterial infections in the bloodstream are known as sepsis.
When you get e.coli infection, it is actually infecting your gut lining. There are different types of infections, some break the cells of the gut lining and can cause bleeding, other times it changes they way the cells exchange water resulting in really watery poops.
The concerning bacteria create toxins that damage cells in one way or another. So when you eat food that these bacteria have been living in you’re eating a lot of toxins which don’t break down that well when cooking. So cells start being damaged or killed in your intestines or in your liver (where everything your intestines absorb is processed). This quickly causes inflammation and an immune response, which tells your body to get rid of everything in your digestive system before more toxins are absorbed. This triggers vomiting and your body stops absorbing water from everything you ate to push it out more quickly.
The food gets digested and nutrients get taken in by the body. If it’s contaminated, let’s say by salmonella, the bacteria also makes it into your body.
Your immune system will quickly find the bacteria, and try to kill it. Part of that means purging the digestive tract (diarrhea and vomit) to get rid of the source. Fever is added to kill off the bacteria that already made it past your digestive system.
It knows it’s save when there are no longer any offending bacteria in your body.
Of course it’s more complicated than this, but hopefully you understand the basics now.
EDIT:
To those of you bitching about me not explaining microbial toxins and things like that, shut up. It’s explain like I’m 5, details like that don’t belong here.
(Not to the people just politely added on info, that’s always welcomed)