Oil Spill In Gulf Of Mexico Affects All Edible Fish

Before the Gulf of Mexico oil spill even happened, there were aguments for and against the eating of fish and seafood. On the one hand, we often hear about mercury toxicity in fish, but on the other hand we do know that fish provide Essential Fatty Acids (EFAs) which are essential for human health. Right now however, there are real health and ethical reasons to completely stop eating fish and other seafood. At the very least to cut down considerably.

Why? Well, because the oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico is a huge disaster that will have a long-term effect on the environment.

I won’t pretend to know much about he technical details of the leak itself, but even if the well is successfully closed soon there is still the issue of the existing level of pollution and its impact on sea-living species.

Do not ignore the issues because the US government has disallowed fishing in the water that is being directly affected by the oil spill. We are not ‘off the hook’ so to speak. What happens under the surface of the water is not obvious to the eye of a casual observer.

There are two serious issues to consider when you decide whether you are comfortable eating seafood. Firstly what types of toxins could find their way onto your plate? Secondly, are you willing to accept the ecological disaster waiting to happen in the form of overfishing the remaining good fishing locations?

Due to the oil spill there are a number of different substances polluting the Gulf of Mexico area and surrounding waters. Firstly we have crude oil and secondly we have the dispersant being used, currently Corexit 9500. Constituents of crude oil include both mercury and lead which are two heavy metals that are highly poisonous to humans. Crude oil also includes benzene, toluene and polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH), all of which cause cancer. Scientists do claim that PAH does not accumulate in fish, but concede that it does accumulate in shellfish. The Corexit 9500 dispersant is a highly toxic chemical, roughly four times more poisonous than oil.

Fish will absorb pollutants from the water through their respiratory systems. These toxins will not be removed from the fish’s bodies as quickly as they are being received and so the poisonous substances such as mercury and lead tend to build up. In addition, some fish are predatory and so these larger fish will have both their own accumulated environmental poisons and those accumulated from the smaller fish. In this way, toxins increase up the food chain and it is the largest, most toxic fish that are typically fished for human consumption.

Mercury is associated with brain impairments, both degenerative in adults and the development of autism and chromosomal disorders (such as Down’s syndrome) in children. Mercury crosses the placenta in pregnant mothers and has its greatest effect on babies and children due to being significantly more concentrated.

Lead affects the brain, nervous system, reproductive system and kidneys. In laboratory tests on animals, no minimum quantity of lead has been considered a safe dose; even the smallest quantities have had a harmful effect. As with mercury, lead has its greatest impact on the health of small children due to being so concentrated. It has been associated with low IQ, slow growth and hearing defects in children.

The chemical dispersant, Corexit 9500, used by BP to try to break up the oil from the surface of the water is known to be both more toxic and also less effective than other chemical disbursants, requiring a stronger application. I feel that we have a case of misaligned corporate ethics coming into this situation as Corexit 9500 was reputedly banned in Britain over a decade ago due to its highly toxic affects on both the environment and people. How ‘British’ Petroleum ended up with such a large supply then I do not know.

The use of this chemical in such quantities and at such oceanic depths is unknown in human history, and the exact contents of the mixture are a trade secret. Expected health effects are respiratory, nervous system, liver, kidney and blood disorders, again grossly affecting children due to their smaller size. At this time over 600,000 gallons of Corexit 9500 have been utilised in an attempt to clean up the oil spill. To make things even worse, the toxicity of Corexit 9500 in a solution of water increases with water temperature, and oil in the water is resulting in higher water temperatures.

Clearly the sea-creatures living in and around the Gulf of Mexico are going to be off the menu for some time. The government won’t willingly allow the people to eat contaminated fish right?

Unfortunately however, the Gulf Coast is responsible for about 50% of the total US harvest in its peak season. Fishing in the Gulf of Mexico is estimated to be worth $2.4 billion per year. Not only is fishing an essential part of USA’s GDP, but people are still eating fish and so the demand causes pressure on other fishing localities to increase the supply.

In addition, many fish, particularly deep ocean fish are migratory and will pass through the Gulf of Mexico waters on their way to someplace else. Some fish will travel up to 200 miles for feeding and reproduction and so it is not possible to easily determine which fish will have been affected by the growing pollution.

The requirement for an increase in fish from other waters has a secondary impact: overfishing. We have already been facing a global overfishing issue for some time. Overfishing is when commercial fishing results in so many fish being caught that the fish are unable to replenish their population. This is a very real circumstance occuring in the oceans today – according to overfishing.org, almost 80% of the world’s fisheries are fully to over-exploited, depleted or in a state of collapse, and over 90% of the stocks of large predatory fish stocks are already gone. This means that we already have a situation where the ocean ecology is under stress and at risk of failure, and we are approaching a situation where it may not even be possible to eat fish due to the food source no longer being available.

Overfishing also directly impacts the animals and birds who reside in a particular area. As food becomes sparse, ocean mammals and birds will either go hungry or spend more time in fishing waters trying to catch fish to eat. These animals can then be caught in the fishing nets themselves, and if unable to free themselves will be killed and then discarded from the fishing haul.

So while those of us who are not yet affected by the disaster in the USA can sit back and watch everything unfold, it will be our fish stock that will be increasingly removed from the oceans to make up for the shortfall in US fishing.

In my opinion the only way that we can both avoid the health issues from eating fish, and take an ethical stance against overfishing in our own backyards is to completely avoid eating fish or their byproducts. Lean protein can be easily obtained by land animals and plants, and so consumption of fish is not needed. We need to look into getting our EFAs from other sources such as flaxseeds, spirulina, chlorella and phytoplankton. Fortunately, fish do not create their own EFAs, but instead break down the EFAs in the microalgae food that they consume. Humans are able to do the same, and so we can replace fish in the diet with supplemental sources of EFA. There are a number of good supplements that are already being manufactured for vegans who wish to increase their consumption EFAs. Personally I have switched from using fish oil capsules as supplements, to marine phytoplanton supplementation.

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Photo Credit: XUDEERIKA