Your fish may contain banned toxic chemicals – study

Salmon in supermarkets in the United States and the United Kingdom may contain banned toxic chemicals related to developmental problems in children, warns new study

while we are all encouraged to eat fish wild. – and some stores have even been accused of putting "wild" tags on farmed fish. As a result, since 2004, the United States and most of Europe are striving to eliminate a certain chemical called PDBE from all waters – farmed fish and wild fish – because they can disrupt hormones and cause effects on the development of people who consume. their.

However, a new study from the University of Pittsburgh found evidence of PBDEs in feeds given to farmed salmon – even in those in environments presumed to be free of PBDEs.

The chemical substances were detected in such high concentrations that the main author, Dr. Carla Ng, warned that this could reach our plates.

"The international food trade system is becoming increasingly global and also applies to animal feed," said Dr. Ng.

"Fish farms can import their animal feed or ingredients in a number of countries." Carla Ng, an badistant professor of civil and environmental engineering at the Swanson School of Engineering at the University of Pittsburgh, said : "The United States and much of Europe banned several PBDEs in 2004 due to environmental problems and public health concerns.

" PBDEs can act as endocrine disruptors and cause effects on development. However, despite restrictions on their use, PBDEs were clbadified as "persistent organic pollutants" under the Stockholm Convention, an international treaty on the environment, in 2009.

The Ng document states that They continue to be found in areas that handle large amounts of e-waste and with poor recycling regulations like China, Thailand and Vietnam.

Therefore, salmon grown in polybrominated diphenyl ether-free environments According to the results, PBDE producers could still contain dangerous amounts of chemicals.

Farmers could use foods containing a type of synthetic flame retardants imported from countries without advanced food safety regulations.

His article, which featured new models on how the chemical gets into food chains, shows that it could also affect food for cattle and sheep.

Predict that human exposure to pollutants appears to be largely concerned with the risk that populations pose to their local environment.

But Dr. Ng's model takes into account the factors that determine the best predictor of PBDEs in farmed salmon

. She said: "We have found that feed is relatively less important in areas where pollutant concentrations in the environment are already high."

Otherwise, contaminated food may be thousands of times more important than the location of the farm to determine the PBDE content of the salmon fillets.

She added that the model could apply to other fish with large global markets such as tilapia or red snapper and to predict the pollutant content of livestock or food produced in the "hot spots" of contamination.

She added: "Hot spots are places identified as having high levels of pollutants

" When these chemicals circulate in the environment, many end up in the ocean. model will help create better "contamination control strategies" such as substituting fish oils for plant materials or decontaminating fish oil prior to human consumption

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