health jurisdiction – doing it wrong
earlier this month, maryland authorities issued a warning against consuming rockfish and bluefish caught in coastal atlantic waters (according to their chart, this doesn’t extend to rockfish caught in the chesapeake, but the chart hasn’t been updated since may ‘07).
the warning says that
pregnant women, women of childbearing age, nursing women and children under 6 should not eat rockfish or bluefish caught in the Atlantic by amateur fishermen. People not in those groups may eat one meal of rockfish, also called striped bass, from the Atlantic every month, and one meal of bluefish every other month.
note that it only applies to fish caught by amateur fishermen. not to commercially-caught rockfish or blues from the same area. why? well, it’s not because commercially-caught fish are safer. it’s because commercially-caught fish fall under federal jurisdiction.
when i have a spare moment, i’m going to check the feds to see if they’re also warning against eating those fish. it’s not like PCBs discriminate by type of fisherman.
update: a quick search on the fish & wildlife service website yields nothing; the FDA is equally useless. USDA?
June 17th, 2009 at 6:10 pm
From what I understand, PCBs haven’t been used in industry for over 30 years. Funny how all of the sudden it’s a problem NOW. We’ve been eating these fish all along without a problem, but now there’s an issue. This reminds me of the hysteria about some flesh-eating bacteria that was supposedly in the rockfish, about 10 years ago. That turned out to be a joke too. I guess some biologist decided that they milked the flesh-eating bacteria story for all the grant money they could get, so they need to create another crisis.
June 18th, 2009 at 8:29 am
wishbone – while the manufacture of PCBs was banned in the united states in 1979, they continue to pose a toxic hazard – according to the EPA, “Today PCBs can still be released into the environment from poorly maintained hazardous waste sites that contain PCBs; illegal or improper dumping of PCB wastes; leaks or releases from electrical transformers containing PCBs; and disposal of PCB-containing consumer products into municipal or other landfills not designed to handle hazardous waste. PCBs may also be released into the environment by the burning of some wastes in municipal and industrial incinerators.”
i see from your email and URL that you’re affiliated with charter fishing on the chesapeake. i can understand that maryland’s consumer warning would be troubling to you; i enjoy fishing on the bay for rockfish and croaker every year. but your swift dismissal of the claims is naive – lack of earlier sound data and government action does not make the current warnings any less valid.
as to the mycobacteriosis issue in rockfish: while the problem was first noticed in 1997, it remains prevalent in the fish today. according to information provided by the chesapeake bay program, ongoing surveys have found 60% of rockfish in maryland’s waters and more than three quarters of the fish in virginia’s waters are affected by the disease. as it primarily affects the internal organs, the majority of afflicted fish aren’t identifiable from a visual inspection. and the concern with mycobacteriosis has more to do with its impact on the fish population, rather than disease transmission to humans, which appears to be minimal.