# Liberated Holocaust survivors dying when given food **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 26, 2010, 1:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453 "2010-01-26T01:19:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2025, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/84 "2025-04-30T03:32:21Z")
This organization actually delivers a rice-based concoction, and admits that it’s not appealing to people in developed nations. If you look in the “Distribution” section, and specifically “Do you feed children here in the United States?” question, they address this. > **[FAQs](https://www.fmsc.org/About-Us/FAQs#halal)** > > Get answers to your frequently asked questions about FMSC, from volunteering to finances, faith, distribution and partner questions. I also do not remember, in everything I’ve read about the men who were rescued from the Andean plane crash in 1972 who survived by eating their fellow passengers, seeing anything about refeeding syndrome. Maybe it was because their starvation was relatively short term (about 2 months) and they were well-nourished beforehand. They also had access to clean-ish water, via melted snow. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2025, 11:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/85 "2025-04-30T11:48:14Z")
The Andes plane survivors also weren’t technically starving - they actually _were_ eating. Initially upon rescue they were fed cautiously but their problem was constipation (seems human flesh has practically no fiber) and not re-feeding syndrome. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2025, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/86 "2025-04-30T22:56:19Z")
Animal products in general have little fiber, which is how cheese got its incorrect reputation for being constipating. The Andean survivors WERE starving; many of their fellow passengers did in fact succumb to this, and not just the injured ones, either. IASTR that one of them had a near-fatal low potassium level, and he probably wasn’t the only one. That he had acquired it slowly was why it hadn’t killed him. All of the people who got off the mountain alive were men; there were several women on the flight, and the only one who didn’t die in the crash died in the avalanche a couple weeks later. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2025, 8:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/87 "2025-05-01T08:41:50Z")
OK, they were starving _slowly_, as opposed eating absolutely nothing at all although some of the weaker ones may have stopped eating. Several starved because they refused to eat human flesh. The two who initially made it down the mountain for help had, apparently, managed to consume enough calories that an extensive re-feeding program wasn’t necessary. The condition of the rest of them would have varied by individual. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453.md?page=4)