Radio Taiwan International
Date: 22 November, 2019
By: John Van Trieste

Cotton: Not a diet food[/caption] When looking for information online, it’s best to treat whatever you find with a healthy dose of skepticism. That’s what one young woman in Taiwan has learned after following a dangerous bit of diet advice she picked up on the internet.

The so-called “cotton ball diet” is the dangerous practice of eating cotton with the belief that it will help with weight loss. As a 16-year-old in Taiwan found out to hard way, eating cotton can have serious consequences.

This young woman slowly ate a cotton blanket over the course of a year until she began to vomit and feel pain in her stomach. Doctors found that she had given herself an intestinal obstruction.

She was lucky that she didn’t suffer worse: doctors say that cotton products aren’t usually made just from pure cotton. They also tend to include synthetic fibers and plastics, and doctors say there is a chance that if eaten, these materials can punch a hole in the intestines.    [FULL  STORY]