Don't eat Nemo
Sydney Harbour is toxic, so it wouldn't be good for your health, either.
Fish eaters poisoned
RECREATIONAL anglers can still catch and eat fish from the harbour even though Sydneysiders who regularly eat harbour seafood have been found with sky-high levels of toxic dioxin chemicals in their blood.
Members of a Sydney family who ate harbour seafood three to four times each week have dioxin levels many times higher than the average Australian, an investigation by the ABC's 7.30 Report has found.
Luca Ianni, 6, the son of a harbour fisherman, Tony Ianni, had dioxin levels seven times higher than the typical Australian child. He had regularly eaten harbour seafood, including prawns and calamari, since he was two.
"We'd bring two or three kilos of prawns home and boil them up, and have them with the family, we'd all eat boiled prawns," Mr Ianni told the 7.30 Report.
Blood test results were even worse for Luca's grandfather Andrew Crisafi, who grew up in Woolloomooloo and began fishing full-time in 1946. The 74-year-old had more than 113 picograms per gram of dioxin in his blood. That is more than 10 times the average for an Australian adult.
Dioxins are toxic chemicals which can concentrate in body fat and accumulate as they move through the food chain, according to the NSW Food Authority. In humans, they can cause chronic conditions such as skin lesions and in some animal experiments they have caused reproductive disorders, immune disorders and cancer.
Commercial harbour fishing was banned in January because high levels of these chemicals were found in seafood, but recreational fishing is still permitted.
Signs began to be put up around the harbour last week warning the public to eat no more than 150 grams of fish, or 300 grams of harbour prawns each month, and suggesting recreational fishermen release their catch.
The Opposition environment spokesman, Michael Richardson, called on the Government to pay the cost of blood testing the families of all 44 fishermen who had been licensed to fish commercially in the harbour. Dioxin testing costs about $2000 a person.
So you know now what to do with that noxious little Nemo if he ends up on the end of your hook.
Fish eaters poisoned
RECREATIONAL anglers can still catch and eat fish from the harbour even though Sydneysiders who regularly eat harbour seafood have been found with sky-high levels of toxic dioxin chemicals in their blood.
Members of a Sydney family who ate harbour seafood three to four times each week have dioxin levels many times higher than the average Australian, an investigation by the ABC's 7.30 Report has found.
Luca Ianni, 6, the son of a harbour fisherman, Tony Ianni, had dioxin levels seven times higher than the typical Australian child. He had regularly eaten harbour seafood, including prawns and calamari, since he was two.
"We'd bring two or three kilos of prawns home and boil them up, and have them with the family, we'd all eat boiled prawns," Mr Ianni told the 7.30 Report.
Blood test results were even worse for Luca's grandfather Andrew Crisafi, who grew up in Woolloomooloo and began fishing full-time in 1946. The 74-year-old had more than 113 picograms per gram of dioxin in his blood. That is more than 10 times the average for an Australian adult.
Dioxins are toxic chemicals which can concentrate in body fat and accumulate as they move through the food chain, according to the NSW Food Authority. In humans, they can cause chronic conditions such as skin lesions and in some animal experiments they have caused reproductive disorders, immune disorders and cancer.
Commercial harbour fishing was banned in January because high levels of these chemicals were found in seafood, but recreational fishing is still permitted.
Signs began to be put up around the harbour last week warning the public to eat no more than 150 grams of fish, or 300 grams of harbour prawns each month, and suggesting recreational fishermen release their catch.
The Opposition environment spokesman, Michael Richardson, called on the Government to pay the cost of blood testing the families of all 44 fishermen who had been licensed to fish commercially in the harbour. Dioxin testing costs about $2000 a person.
So you know now what to do with that noxious little Nemo if he ends up on the end of your hook.
posted by Guambat Stew at Thursday, April 20, 2006
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