Most of the shrimp that consumers buy and eat in the United States is imported from polluted ponds in tropical countries and may contain chemicals banned from shrimp farming in the United States, according to a new report by Public Citizen. The consumer group urged consumers to think twice when buying shrimp in the grocery stores, to check the label to see whether it is farm-raised and to ask questions in restaurants about where the shrimp on their menus is produced.
The report, Chemical Cocktail: The Health Impacts of Eating Farm-Raised Shrimp, is the second in a series that documents the dangers of shrimp aquaculture.
Shrimp aquaculture uses a factory-farming model that douses shrimp with pesticides, antibiotics and other chemicals. Shrimp is the No. 1 seafood choice in the United States, and nearly 90 percent of it is imported. About 80 percent of the shrimp imported from foreign markets is farm-raised, the consumer group said.
“Every time you take a bite of shrimp, you may be ingesting a lot more than you’ve bargained for,” said Andrianna Natsoulas, field director at Public Citizen’s food program. “That shrimp cocktail that looks so appetizing could be a chemical cocktail in disguise.”
Shrimp farms depend on staggering amounts of antibiotics, fungicides, algaecides and pesticides. Over time, bacteria exposed to antibiotics may become more resistant to those antibiotics, and patients infected with antibiotic-resistant bacteria will be more difficult to treat, Public Citizen said.
Unfortunately, while many of the antibiotics used as part of the factory farming of shrimp are banned in the United States, they are being used in other shrimp-producing countries, and residues of U.S.-banned antibiotics have been detected in farmed shrimp and other seafood shipped from Asia to the United States and Europe.
By Spring 2005, a mandatory country-of-origin label will be required on all seafood sold in grocery stores. This label will tell consumers where shrimp comes from and whether it is farm-raised or wild-caught. Although this label will apply only to grocery stores, consumers should ask restaurants where they buy their shrimp from, Public Citizen said.
(via Public Citizen)
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