Fish is central to the diet in Bangladesh. Many people chew small fish such as mola whole, bones and all, and sometimes swallow the bone of a larger fish by accident. On 1 July 2026 Jagonews24 asked whether fish bones do the body good or harm. Nutrition and medical research says both: the soft bones of small fish are a good source of calcium, while large, sharp bones can lodge in the throat or gullet and cause serious injury.
What fish bones contain
Fish bones are rich in calcium. MedlinePlus, the health information service of the U.S. National Library of Medicine, says calcium builds strong bones and teeth and helps blood clot, nerves send and receive signals, muscles contract and relax and the heart keep a normal beat. It lists salmon and sardines canned with their soft bones among calcium sources.
How much of that calcium the body takes up was measured by researchers from Norway's National Institute of Nutrition and Seafood Research, who published their study in Nutrition & Metabolism in 2010. Ten healthy young men ate test meals with 800 mg of calcium from cod bones, salmon bones or, for comparison, calcium carbonate. Mean absorption was 21.9 percent from cod bones, 22.5 percent from salmon bones and 27.4 percent from calcium carbonate. The authors concluded that the bones of both fish are suitable as natural calcium sources in foods or supplements.
Small fish eaten whole
In Bangladesh small fish are usually eaten whole, head and bones included. A 2007 review by Roos and colleagues in the Journal of Nutrition found that small fish made up 50 to 80 percent of all fish eaten during the fish production season in rural Bangladesh and Cambodia. Because many are eaten whole they are a rich source of calcium, and some are also rich in vitamin A, iron and zinc; the authors describe mola as a vitamin A-rich fish.
An earlier rat study, published in the British Journal of Nutrition in 2000, compared whole mola from Bangladesh with skimmed milk. It found that calcium from small fish with bones was available to the body, though perhaps not as available as calcium from milk, and the researchers urged that production and consumption of small fish be promoted among people who consume little milk or milk products.
The risk of large, sharp bones
Medical research shows that fish bones are the most common food-related object to lodge in the throat or gullet of adults, especially in Asia. In a 2016 review in Clinical Endoscopy, Kim Hyun-Uk of Jeju National University School of Medicine in South Korea wrote that 80 to 90 percent of swallowed foreign bodies pass on their own without complications, but bleeding and perforation are more common with fish bones than with other objects. A bone that pierces the gullet wall can create a life-threatening connection with the aorta.
According to the same review, the risk rises the longer a bone stays lodged, and also depends on the type of bone and on bones longer than 3 cm. Bones stuck in the gullet are seen mostly in people over 40, which researchers link to the decline of swallowing with age.
What to do if a bone gets stuck
If a bone gets stuck, do not try to force it down with home remedies; see a doctor or go to hospital quickly. The 2016 guideline of the European Society of Gastrointestinal Endoscopy (ESGE) says sharp objects in the gullet need emergency removal by endoscopy, preferably within 2 hours and at the latest within 6 hours. The Kim review lists these signs of complications:
- Vomiting blood
- Difficulty swallowing
- Shortness of breath
- Fever
- Pain in the chest and back
The feeling that something is stuck can last for hours even after a bone has passed or been removed, and a doctor can check whether any bone remains. Anyone who eats the bones of small fish should make sure they are soft and chew them well.
Photo: Salil Kumar Mukherjee / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Sources: Jagonews24, MedlinePlus (U.S. National Library of Medicine), Nutrition & Metabolism (Malde et al., 2010), Journal of Nutrition (Roos et al., 2007), British Journal of Nutrition (Larsen et al., 2000), Clinical Endoscopy (Kim, 2016), European Society of Gastrointestinal Endoscopy (ESGE) guideline, 2016
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