Tuberculosis is a chronic wasting disease, with pulmonary tuberculosis being the most common type. Patients require nutritious foods that are high in protein, sugar, and fat. However, it has been reported that tuberculosis patients, especially those taking anti-tuberculosis drugs such as isoniazid and rifampicin, often suffer from food poisoning or food allergies. Common examples include:
Eggplant: Tuberculosis patients are prone to allergies when eating eggplant during anti-tuberculosis treatment. A study on random sampling found that all patients in the group who ate eggplant developed varying degrees of allergic reactions within 40-60 minutes. These reactions include facial flushing, skin itching, irritability, general erythema, and chest tightness. If a tuberculosis patient experiences this after eating eggplant, mild cases can be treated with anti-allergy medication, and they should avoid eggplant and similar foods for a period of time. Severe cases require emergency medical treatment.
Milk: When taking rifampicin with milk, very little of the drug is absorbed after one hour. In contrast, when taken on an empty stomach, the drug concentration in the blood reaches its peak within one hour. Therefore, while taking rifampicin, one must not consume milk or other beverages at the same time to prevent reduced drug absorption. It is not advisable to consume lactose and sugary foods while taking isoniazid, as lactose can completely block the human body's absorption of isoniazid, preventing it from taking effect.
Certain Fish: Fish that can cause allergies are generally non-scaled fish and stale saltwater or freshwater fish. Non-scaled fish include tuna, mackerel, horse mackerel, saury, squid, and sardines. Stale saltwater fish include hairtail and yellow croaker. Freshwater fish include carp. During treatment of tuberculosis with isoniazid, consuming these fish can easily lead to allergic symptoms. Mild symptoms include headache, dizziness, nausea, skin flushing, and mild conjunctival congestion. Severe symptoms include facial flushing, a burning sensation, palpitations, rapid pulse, numbness and swelling of the lips and face, urticarial rash, nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain, diarrhea, difficulty breathing, high blood pressure, and even hypertensive crisis and cerebral hemorrhage. There have been reports of deaths from this both domestically and internationally. The reason is that isoniazid is a monoamine oxidase inhibitor. The aforementioned fish have high histamine content, and due to the lack of sufficient monoamine oxidase to oxidize it, histamine accumulates in large amounts, causing the aforementioned symptoms. Not only should high-histamine fish be avoided during isoniazid treatment, but they should also be avoided for two weeks after stopping the medication. When cooking other types of fish, adding an appropriate amount of hawthorn before steaming or braising, or adding some vinegar, can reduce the histamine content. If a toxic reaction occurs, the person should be rushed to the hospital for emergency treatment.