FDA Commissioner Confident About Safety of Gulf Seafood in Oil Spill Aftermath
Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Commissioner Margaret Hamburg has released statements to support the reopening of Florida, Louisiana and Mississippi state waters to commercial fishing. According to Hamburg, “we are confident all appropriate steps have been taken to ensure that seafood harvested from waters being opened today is safe and that Gulf seafood lovers everywhere can be confident eating and enjoying the fish that will be coming out of this area.”
Meanwhile, some are questioning whether inspector sniff tests are sufficient to ensure the safety of seafood from Gulf of Mexico waters. Experts reportedly say that the smell tests are an efficient and inexpensive way to test for fish safety and claim they are currently the only way to test fish for chemical dispersants. At least one oysterman and shrimp and crab fisherman was not convinced, saying, “If I put fish in a barrel and poured oil and Dove detergent over that, and mixed it up, would you eat that fish? I wouldn’t feed it to you or my family. I’m afraid someone’s going to get sick.”
According to a news source, FDA, which is apparently developing a tissue test for oil spill contaminants, has repeatedly declined to provide information about toxic substances in oil. The Environmental Protection Agency, which contends that BP did not make things worse by using nearly 2 million gallons of just one dispersant on the oil spill, has reportedly indicated that the dispersants used in the Gulf pose a low public health risk. While President Barack Obama (D) apparently consumed Gulf seafood during a recent visit to Mississippi, some scientists are continuing to leave it out of their diets until the government releases more information on which species are being monitored and the levels of toxic chemicals detected. See FDA and EPA press statements, Reuters and The Associated Press, August 2, 2010.
