Canberra prison detainee Isa Islam's hunger strike could extend for some weeks to come if he refuses food or medical treatment but continues to drink water, according to an expert on human biology.
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Islam, 45, is currently in a single room, shackled to his bed frame and under close guard by ACT Corrections officers at the Canberra Hospital.
He is now beyond day 60 of the hunger strike which began in prison. He was admitted to hospital on January 10. A spokesperson for the justice department said on Tuesday his condition remained unchanged. He was still refusing to eat and no further negotiations had taken place.
Islam is serving consecutive sentences for two violent offences. In the first incident, he stabbed a neighbour and in the second, he repeatedly bashed another prison inmate.
He provided an exclusive interview to The Canberra Times last week, in which he outlined his grievances with the prison and the reasons for his hunger strike in articulate detail. No photographs or recording devices were permitted.
Professor Stefan Broer, from the Australian National University's Research School of Biology, said that a person of average weight and size who does not eat but continues to drink water could survive much longer than most people would imagine.
"From our primitive past, human beings have an inbuilt metabolic program which allows us to survive through lengthy periods of going without food," Prof Broer said.
"Our brains need glucose. Even an average size person has about 18kg of fat which the body will consume to maintain the glucose levels it needs to keep the brain functioning.
"Once that available fat supply is exhausted, the body then switches to another survival program."
This program is called ketogenesis, when ketone bodies are produced in response to lowered blood glucose levels.
"These ketone bodies are our essential back-up fuel for long periods without food," Prof Broer said.
"It's a physiological adaptation to a low carbohydrate environment. "
Prof Broer said that there was no exact length of time on how long a person could survive without food as this would depend on an individual's size, weight and fat reserves beforehand.
He said what would be noticeable during ketogenesis would be a fruity, aromatic breath smell like acetone.
"This is a clear indication that this metabolic program is running," he said.
He said that people who were in an advanced stage of starvation probably would not experience the extreme hunger pangs felt at the beginning but taking any water would likely trigger a reaction.
"Drinking water would be like telling the stomach that food is coming, but it isn't," he said.
"That's when you may get a strong stomach reaction, like gastric reflux."
Islam and the ACT government are at a stand-off, with the prisoner refusing to eat until the government agrees to a negotiation on his demands with the ACT Corrections executive director Jon Peach, or a delegate equally empowered to seek to address his concerns, and the government refusing to negotiate until he starts to eat.
