But First, -Let’s Talk About Pica. What is “Pica?”

Let’s talk about something leading up to my topic. “Pica” is a medical condition or desire in animals which is characterized by an appetite to ingest non-food items, things which are without nutritional value. Medically in humans, Pica is diagnosed as being such if the behavior has occurred for over one month. Particularly common in small children who often eat things they pick off the ground like dust balls, cardboard or wall paint, and ingest. Not merely ‘curiosity tasting’ but actual habitual, repetitive eating. It is also a common diagnosis in pregnant women. Eating one’s own hair or plucking individual strands of hair and sucking on the fleshy follicle that come out with the hair strand is a very common example of Pica in women, but males with Pica do this to their hair also. It’s not gender specific. Speculation is that these cravings are the human body’s attempt to get minerals or vitamins missing in their current diet even if the choices are futile ones. One can ‘love the taste of cardboard glue’ on brown corrugated cardboard boxes and yet, this does absolutely nothing to fulfill the body’s deficiency of whatever mineral it craves. Pica cravings can be related to an underlying mental or physical illness too, in which case professional help should be sought.

The developmentally disabled are also at particular risk of Pica and for their health and safety, must be monitored for Pica as well as their immediate environment for ‘missing items.’ A hole in a wall or a section of peeling paint on a wall that seems to be getting larger is a good example of what to look for.

Missing erasers, pencils, yarn, torn pieces from newspapers or magazines, missing staples from magazines and so forth. Yes, Pica sufferers will sometime crave metallic objects like staples, paperclips or little wads of tin foil. The afflicted must be monitored closely to prevent behaviorally ingesting items in and around the home; this includes soil or sand from play park areas.

Dirt along roadsides are a particular danger because of use in the past of lead-laden automotive fuels having left residues of exhaust products on/near the road and shoulders of the road, and the use of old contaminated oil for dust control in previous decades are still present. Play park sand can be particularly dangerous too, not just for the fact that it is non-food and potentially intestine-binding, but for the parasites and bacteria that may be present in the sand from animal droppings. Vectors here would include cats, birds, raccoons to name just a scant few. Pica is the reason for a common ailment with dogs, which is why dogs often require a de-worming treatment. Dogs and cats often get parasites from eating mice or crickets they find (alive or dead) and a treatment with an OTC (”over-the-counter”) or veterinary-prescribed medicine like Panacur is required. The vector there is that mice tend to harbor the parasites (”worms”) and excrete them via feces elimination. Even crickets have gutload parasites which are potentially dangerous. I used to raise Australian Bearded Dragon reptiles and the occasional rapid weight-loss of my breeder dragons would occur, and once was traced to a batch of unhealthy crickets that I had purchased online from a reputable cricket breeder. The crickets were infested with parasites which my reptiles ate and they, too, became ill, had watery excreta and as a direct result, rapidly became lethargic and skinny. Treatment with the product Panacur (a whitish salve paste in a toothpaste-like tube that is smeared upon a food-items and offered to the patient,) the parasites were gone within a few days and the reptiles began to gain weight and quickly regained their health.

Pica in humans can include the consumption of many items including paper, cardboard, soil, hair, coal, chalk, pencils, feces, etc. Clay is also cited as a common Pica choice. Clay, particularly of a very certain aluminum silicate-containing variety called Kaolinite, is the substance we’ll be examining shortly.

Kaolinite, a.k.a. Kaolin

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Kaolinite is one of the Earth’s most common clay minerals. This material is also known as China Clay or Kaolin. The name comes from the Gaoling or Kao-Ling province in China. Kaolin is mined throughout the world including France, Brazil, U.K., Bulgaria, Germany, Korea, Australia, P.R. of China and the USA. It is often used in high-end porcelain dishware and other bright and colorful porcelain products.

Uses for Kaolin Clay

Kaolin is used in medicine, toothpaste, ceramics, as a food additive and in coated glossy paper. It is also used as a diffusing material in white incandescent light bulbs, and in cosmetics. A main use for kaolin is in the production of fine porcelain.

Kaolin is used in paint to extend the compound titanium dioxide and to modify gloss levels, used also the production of rubber tires as a binding agent and is used in some types of adhesives.

Kaolin is used in a spray to repel or deter insect damage and prevent sun-scald in apples ripening on the tree. Formerly, it was use as an ingredient in a popular upset stomach remedy “Kaopectate” for it ability to relieve diarrhea and to coat, soothe and settle upset stomachs.

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Parrots in South America had long been noted for eating slightly toxic and poisonous fruits and then flying to a particular riverbank to consume via Pica a bit of this chalky white kaolin clay, -they soothe their upset stomachs with kaolin clay! The remedy “Kaopectate” and “Kaomagma” both use it too as a main ingredient, but switched briefly from the use of Kaolin over fears of Kaolin’s aluminum content, aluminum being a cited cause of Alzheimer’s disease. They have since switched back to Kaolin-containing compounds because they are very effective and the amount per dose of these products is deemed to be quite safe. The Naval Medical Research Center in April 2008 made a successful use of a Kaolin-containing compound to create a ‘Quick-Clot Combat Gauss’ for trauma patients in the battlefield. Kaolin has many varied and interesting uses.

But What’s This About Radioactive White Paper?

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 Oh I saved the best item for last! Kaolinite can contain very small trace amounts of thorium and uranium, both radioactive materials which can useful in radiological dating of ancient porcelain objects, and surrounding soils. Kaolin is used in the paper industry to make white paper glossier. A single magazine does not contain nearly enough radioactive uranium or thorium to trip a security monitor, but an entire TRUCKLOAD of high-end magazines, books and/or flyers DOES have enough detectable kaolin-derived radiation to set-off an overly sensitive radiation detector/monitor! Apparently this has happened before! As one that regularly crosses an international border and is somewhat familiar with the protocol of scanning and detection, I find this very fascinating!

So there is something to think about if you ever see a truck pulled over at Security at an international border crossing/inspection station, and there seems to be ‘something going on’ at the radiation detection stage of inspection, – Don’t Panic! –The tractor-trailer being tested might only have next month’s entire eastern seaboard’s supply of GOOD HOUSEKEEPING magazine on board (and a very upset and nervous driver!)