When is it Safe to Eat Raw Oysters?

In this episode, BrainStuff looks at if there's any truth behind the old wives' tale that you can't eat oysters in months without the letter 'R.'

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
Welcome to brain Stuff from how Stuff Works. Hey, brain stuff,
it's Christian saga here. Did you know that every month
sands May, June, July, and August has the letter R
in its name. Don't look it up, take my word
for it. Did you also know there's an old wives
tale that you shouldn't eat raw oysters in months without

(00:26):
the letter R in it. Once again, you don't need
to look it up. I'm not gonna lie to you.
The logic behind this is that if you eat oysters
during these months you could get sick. Sounds like crazy talk, right,
and perhaps so, perhaps not. But if you think about it,
the months without an R fall during the summer in
the northern hemisphere, and the truth is that if you

(00:48):
eat raw oysters in the summer, you do run the
risk of getting violently sick. That's because, and let me
tell you this does not come from an old wife.
When the weather is warm back to area known as
Vibrio vulnificious and Vibrio parahemoliticus thrive, and these pathogens multiply

(01:09):
like nobody's business in warm water, especially in the Gulf
of Mexico, where there are a lot of oysters harvested,
so eating raw oysters during the summer theoretically could increase
your chances of becoming sick. Unlike chicken, pork, or hamburger,
all of which stink to high heaven when they go bad,

(01:31):
oysters do not, so you can't tell when an oyster
has turned the corner. They're also usually not ranted to
the taste. However, you'll feel the effects about twenty four
to forty eight hours after eating an oyster that's gone
bad with vibrio chills, fever, vomiting, diarrhea, you know the drill.

(01:53):
In some people, high doses of Vibrio can actually be
life threatening, especially the elderly, those with compromised immune systems,
and people who drink too much alcohol. But let's be clear,
infections caused by all Vibrio species are rare. The Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention estimates they are about eighty

(02:14):
thousand vibrio illnesses of all types each year in the
United States. More than half are related to eating contaminated food.
The most common strain, Vibrio parahemolyticus, is responsible for forty
five thousand illnesses annually. Those numbers are a drop in

(02:35):
the bucket compared to salmonila, which the c d C
says is responsible for more than one million illnesses each year.
Those eating oysters harvested from the Gulf Coast, where the
water typically is warmer than along the East and West coasts,
should be on guard. That's because vibrio thrives when the
water temperature near sixty eight degrees fahrenheit or twenty degrees celsius.

(03:00):
So if you're going to saddle up to an oyster
bar during the summer months and are concerned whether these
slimy suckers are contamidated, well ask the chef where they're
harvested from. Most chefs are reliable and only by from
reputable fisheries and purveyors they trust. Or you can just
stick to the cold water East or West coast oysters

(03:22):
until the chillier months return in the Gulf. Today's episode
was written by John Paraitano, produced by Dylan Fagan, and
for more on this and other topics, please visit us
at how stuff works dot com.