Eight children and an adult have died after eating sea turtle meat on Pemba Island in the Zanzibar archipelago and 78 others have been taken to hospital, authorities say.

Sea turtle meat is considered a delicacy by Zanzibar’s people even though it periodically results in deaths from chelonitoxism, a type of food poisoning.

The adult who died late Friday was the mother of one of the children who succumbed earlier, said the Mkoani District medical officer, Dr Haji Bakari.

He said the turtle meat was consumed last Tuesday.

Bakari told The Associated Press that laboratory tests confirmed all the victims had eaten sea turtle meat.

Authorities in Zanzibar, which is a semi-autonomous region of the East African nation of Tanzania, sent a disaster management team led by Hamza Hassan Juma, who urged people to avoid consuming sea turtles.

In November 2021, seven people, including a three-year-old, died on Pemba after eating turtle meat.

-AAP