{"id":164082,"date":"2024-10-29T19:44:28","date_gmt":"2024-10-29T19:44:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/10\/29\/what-is-ricin-the-biological-substance-police-say-they-found-at-southport-suspects-home\/"},"modified":"2024-10-29T19:44:28","modified_gmt":"2024-10-29T19:44:28","slug":"what-is-ricin-the-biological-substance-police-say-they-found-at-southport-suspects-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/10\/29\/what-is-ricin-the-biological-substance-police-say-they-found-at-southport-suspects-home\/","title":{"rendered":"What is ricin – the biological substance police say they found at Southport suspect’s home?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"What<\/div>


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The teenager accused of stabbing three girls to death in Southport now faces two further charges.<\/p>\n

Axel Rudakubana, 18, from Lancashire, faces one charge of the “production of a biological toxin, namely ricin, contrary to Section 1 of the Biological Weapons Act 1974”.<\/p>\n

He also faces a terror charge of possession of information “likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism, contrary to Section 58 of the Terrorism Act 2000”.<\/p>\n

This came after police said they found ricin and an al Qaeda training manual<\/a><\/strong>, during a search of his home.<\/p>\n

He had already been charged with three counts of murder and 10 counts of attempted murder following the mass stabbing<\/a><\/strong> at a Taylor Swift-themed dance workshop in July.<\/p>\n

What is ricin?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Ricin is found naturally in castor beans.<\/p>\n

When the beans are processed to make castor oil, it leaves a mash that contains the toxin.<\/p>\n

It’s classed as a biological substance because of its origin, but it doesn’t spread from person to person like a virus or bacteria.<\/p>\n

But like a chemical, it can cause cross-contamination, for example through contact on clothing.<\/p>\n

The UK Health Security Agency says there is no evidence that any member of the public, or the emergency services, was exposed to the ricin allegedly found at Rudakubana’s home.<\/p>\n

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\n Image:<\/span>
\n Castor beans. File pic: iStock
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Anybody who had been exposed would have developed the first symptoms within 24 hours or so.<\/p>\n

If it’s inhaled it causes progressive breathing difficulties, ultimately causing respiratory failure and death.<\/p>\n

If it’s ingested it initially causes diarrhoea and vomiting that can be severe enough to result in dehydration.<\/p>\n

Days later the body’s organs begin to shut down, possibly causing death.<\/p>\n

Skin contact causes irritation, but isn’t itself serious. The risk is that people who pick it up on their fingers, for example, then ingest it.<\/p>\n

Roughly 2-6% of cases of ingestion result in death.<\/p>\n

The fatality rate from inhalation is unknown.<\/p>\n

No information has been given by police on what form the ricin was found in.<\/p>\n

Read more from Sky News:
Ex-Tory MP carried out ‘brazen and drunken’ sexual misconduct<\/a>
Tootsie and Young Frankenstein star dies<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

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Keep up with all the latest news from the UK and around the world by following Sky News<\/p>\n

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But in previous cases, it has been processed as a powder, mist, pellet or dissolved in water or acid.<\/p>\n

In 1978, the Bulgarian dissident Georgi Markov was assassinated in London by an operative, thought to be from the Bulgarian secret service, who used an umbrella to inject a pellet of ricin under his skin.<\/p>\n

In 2013, letters tainted with ricin were sent to President Obama, the New York mayor, and others.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

On that occasion, nobody came to harm.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n


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Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The teenager accused of stabbing three girls to death in Southport now faces two further charges. Axel Rudakubana, 18, from Lancashire, faces one charge of the “production of a biological toxin, namely ricin, contrary to Section 1 of the Biological Weapons Act 1974”. He also faces a terror charge of possession of information “likely to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":164083,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/e3.365dm.com\/24\/10\/768x432\/skynews-castor-beans-ricin_6732325.jpg?20241029182523","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[607],"tags":[2119,148,6273,127496,87246,73692,10803],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/164082"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=164082"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/164082\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":164084,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/164082\/revisions\/164084"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/164083"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=164082"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=164082"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=164082"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}