No detectable risk from mercury in seafood, s...( an fish like tuna swordfish and shark....)

an fish like tuna, swordfish and shark. The fish eaten by women in the Seychelles had approximately the same levels of mercury as those eaten by consumers in the United States but they ate much more fish than most people in the United States. The Seychelles women, however, had an average of six times as much mercury in their bodies, as measured in hair samples, as most people in the US.

"This study indicates that there are no detectable adverse effects in a population consuming large quantities of a wide variety of ocean fish," says Myers, the senior author of the Seychelles study and an internationally recognized authority on mercury. "These are the same fish that end up on the dinner table in the United States and around the world."

In the current study doctors and nurses tested the children in a variety of ways and measured 21 different cognitive, behavioral, and neurological functions such as concentration, attention span, problem-solving abilities, intelligence, and motor skills. Only two functions varied slightly according to mercury level: Children of women with higher mercury levels were slightly less likely to be hyperactive, and sons of such women did slightly worse on a pegboard task. Statistically, both findings are likely due to chance, the researchers say.

The Seychelles findings apply to fish bought and sold commercially, at grocery stores, supermarkets, seafood markets, and restaurants. Those fish are already regulated based on their mercury levels. Consumers should carefully follow advisories about eating fish caught in lakes and rivers, since there are hundreds of polluted waterways whose fish are dangerous to eat in abundance, often because of pollutants like PCBs.

The Seychelles study came about as a result of previous work by the same Rochester team, which put together the first precise data showing that pre-natal exposure to mercury could harm a developing child. Their study of the victims of an accidenta
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Contact: Tom Rickey
trickey@admin.rochester.edu
585-275-7954
University of Rochester Medical Center
15-May-2003

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