Inadequate seafood testing uncovered in US

The next time you head to the grocery store for your seafood fix, perhaps think again before picking up some of your favorites. We all know that many farmers of seafood use veterinary drugs in order to prevent disease in their products. However, those same drugs protecting our fishy friends can collect in the food and be harmful to humans at high concentrations. To protect against the potential of human infection, regulating agencies of importing countries set concentration limits on these drugs and are responsible for testing all imported seafood.

While in theory this concept makes it sound like you need not worry about that fresh tilapia you bought at Giant, a recent study led by Dr. David C. Love of the Hopkins Center for a Livable Future will make you think otherwise. The researchers found that imported seafood is often in violation of the safety standards set by regulating agencies and that the Unites States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) lags far behind the European Union, Japan and Canada in terms of drugs tested and amount of imported seafood tested. They looked at data from 2000 to 2008 on seafood imported to the United States, nations in the European Union, Japan and Canada.

In terms of sheer amount of seafood imported, the United States tested a scant 2 percent of total imports, compared with 20-50 percent for the E.U., 18 percent for Japan and 2-15 percent for Canada. At such low testing rates, the safety of any seafood consumed could be called into question, especially for consumers in the United States.

To make matters worse for the U.S., Love and colleagues found that the FDA tests for only 13 types of veterinary drugs while the E.U. tests for 34 and Japan for 27. The seafood products actually in violation in the U.S. include crab, shrimp and prawn as the biggest offenders on the market, while eel, sole and tilapia also did not do so well in testing.

Each regulating agency in the study showed some areas that could be improved on in terms of testing measures. However ,the blame cannot be laid entirely on the importing nations.

When the researchers looked at the exporters of seafood, they found that some nations did not fare as well as others. Vietnam was by far the worst exporting country, with 43 percent of their seafood imported to the U.S. being in violation and an even higher 59 percent in violation for Japan. Following Vietnam's lead, China, Indonesia, Taiwan and Thailand also each had high rates of exported seafood in violation of regulation standards.

While the study was able to use the data obtained to identified high risk seafood and exporters, the researchers acknowledged that one major issue was the lack of transparency in data provided by the FDA, E.U., Canada and Japan. For example, tests can be done on either random samples of imported seafood or on seafood known to contain high levels of contamination.

However, no regulating body identified whether tests were from random sampling or from targeted sampling of high risk products. Such information would provide useful insight into interpreting the data beyond the raw numbers.

Based on these results, it is easy to be scared away from eating any form of seafood. However, it is important to remember that many seafoods are still safe.

Love encourages consumers to be acquainted with the country of origin and how the organism was raised. By becoming a more informed buyer, you can enjoy your food while knowing it is safe to eat!