Urinary Thiocyanate Content and Mean Daily Consumption of Flour

Ingested cyanide is converted to thiocyanate in the body, thus urinary thiocyanate gives a measure of cyanide intake over the preceding few days. We have developed Kit D1 (Haque and Bradbury, 1999b) for determination of thiocyanate in urine, which was successfully trialled in Mozambique in October 1999 (Ernesto et al. 2002a). There is a stepwise procedure Protocol D1 for the use of this kit. These kits are available free of charge to health workers and agriculturalists in developing countries.

See also Summary of kits available

Collection of samples of cassava flour and urine from school children in the same village followed by analyses for total cyanide in the flour and urinary thiocyanate, allows the calculation of the daily consumption of cassava flour by the children. By this means it was possible to distinguish between villages in which the daily consumption of cassava flour was moderate and where there were no recent konzo cases, from villages in which the daily consumption of cassava was very high and where konzo was persistent amongst the children. (Cardoso et al. 2004).