Study: Recreational fishers can ingest too much mercury if they eat their own catch and lots of other seafood

Recreational fishers who eat their own catch and eat a lot of other seafood may risk ingesting too much mercury, a new study shows.

“We know that recreational fishers are potentially an extra vulnerable group when it comes to ingesting too much mercury since they eat a lot of fish. In addition, there is a lot of fishing along the coast where the water is more polluted,” researcher Martin Wiech warns.

In a new study, researchers from the Institute of Marine Research have looked at a special group of recreational fishers – those who fish for crayfish.

“We saw that when they only eat crayfish, they are well below the tolerable weekly intake for mercury, but if they eat a lot of fish with a high content of mercury in addition to this, they are in danger of ingesting too much mercury,” Wiech adds.

Mercury is a toxic element and an environmental toxin that can accumulate in animals and humans. It can cause damage to the nervous system and kidneys. Most of the mercury that humans ingest comes from the food we eat, especially seafood.

“There are many indications that recreational fishers often catch fish that have more mercury than the fish found in the store because they fish along the coast where there is more pollution,” Wiech notes.

Source: © NTB Scanpix / #Norway Today / #NorwayTodayNews

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