Health authorities advise paying attention to the color and texture to identify this product: “when heated, if it melts into a yellowish tone, it is nitro salt”
14ymedio, Havna, October 1, 2026 / Two people died this Tuesday in Holguín after ingesting nitro salt in their food. The deceased are Clara Suárez Rodríguez, 63, and Manuel Fernández Fernández, 65. Yaneisi Peña Escobar, 37, the woman’s daughter, is hospitalized in serious condition as a result of the same incident.
The information was released by the General Directorate of Health of Holguín in a swift move, since it had barely circulated as a rumor beforehand. According to the agency, the events took place on the night of September 29, when the Emergency Intensive Care Unit of the Emergency Department of the Vladimir Ilich Lenin General Provincial Hospital received the three family members.
Yaneisi Peña Escobar, who lives in the Ramón Quintana neighborhood, works as a domestic employee in a house near hers where there is a sausage-making operation, a fact that the investigation considers relevant, although it is not known how or where she obtained the salt. According to the official information, Peña cooked with that product and ate, together with her mother and stepfather. Shortly afterward she began sweating and having convulsions and was admitted to the hospital already in a coma, so she was placed on mechanical ventilation.
Shortly afterward she began sweating and having convulsions and was admitted to the hospital already in a coma, so she was placed on mechanical ventilation
Clara Suárez and Manuel Fernández, with vagus nerve symptoms, were sent to the hospital on medical advice, but upon arrival at the facility a rapid, severe neurological deterioration with a poor course was observed that required resuscitation maneuvers. Both died shortly afterward from pulmonary edema.
“We regret these painful losses, which could have been avoided, and we join in the grief of family and friends. The health system in the province, together with joint forces of the Ministry of the Interior, is continuing the investigative process to clarify all the elements,” the note states.
Peña Escobar, for her part, remains hospitalized in critical condition and under intensive treatment, but has been “awake, conscious, cooperative and off the ventilation equipment” since this Wednesday.
On August 25, 52 people, including two pregnant women and three minors, suffered another food poisoning in Santiago de Cuba. The health authorities also disclosed the facts in that case, although they did not say what had caused the patients to need treatment for “abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea and a cramping sensation in the mouth and hands.” In addition, some of them showed “mild and moderate dehydration, due to vomiting and bowel movements.”
Local sources cited at the time by Martí Noticias pointed to the use of nitro salt and bread made with inedible oil as possible causes.
In February 2025, two women lost their lives after ingesting nitro salt. Doraima García Moroña and her daughter Nashlyn Salet Hernández García had received the product, according to the official version, through a relative who found it, as opposed to the initial idea that they bought it on the informal market. In that incident, three more people were hospitalized.
On that occasion, when information was also released more quickly than usual, the authorities urged the population to be on the lookout for the product, for fear that it was widely circulating on the island. The América Arias Gynecological and Obstetric Hospital published a post, shared by Canal Habana, explaining what nitro salt is and the serious harm it can cause, including death. The most important thing, they advised, is to pay attention to the color and texture to distinguish it from ordinary salt and, when in doubt, to heat it: “if it melts into a yellowish tone, it is nitro salt.”
Translated by GH.
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