The question arose here a while ago as to the value of removing fat from bacon and other meats before cooking and eating. My sense has been that toxic chemicals tend to store in fat tissue. And here's clear support for that. It comes in the context of a just-published study on the anti-fertility impact of environmental pollutants. Here's a bit about it, with the link to the full text from the NIH and their link to the actual study online. And I've bolded the instructions re animal fat, etc.

sheila

"Couples with high levels of PCBs and similar environmental pollutants take longer to achieve pregnancy in comparison to other couples with lower levels of the pollutants, according to a preliminary study by researchers at the National Institutes of Health and other institutions.

PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls) are chemicals that have been used as coolants and lubricants in electrical equipment. They are part of a category of chemicals known as persistent organochlorine pollutants and include industrial chemicals and chemical byproducts as well as pesticides. In many cases, the compounds are present in soil, water, and in the food chain. The compounds are resistant to decay, and may persist in the environment for decades. Some, known as persistent lipophilic organochlorine pollutants, accumulate in fatty tissues. Another type, called perfluorochemicals , are used in clothing, furniture, adhesives, food packaging, heat-resistant non-stick cooking surfaces, and the insulation of electrical wire.

Exposure to these pollutants is known to have a number of effects on human health, but their effects on human fertility — and the likelihood of couples achieving pregnancy-- have not been extensively studied.

"Our findings suggest that persistent organochlorine pollutants may play a role in pregnancy delay," said the study's first author, Germaine Buck Louis, Ph.D., director of the Division of Epidemiology, Statistics, and Prevention Research at the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) at NIH.

Dr. Buck Louis added that individuals may limit their exposure by removing and avoiding the fat of meat and fish, and by limiting the consumption of animal products.

The study was published online in Environmental Health Perspectives and is available online at http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/2012/11/1204996/. In addition to researchers at the NICHD, the study also included investigators from the Texas A&M Health Science Center, College Station, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Emory University, Atlanta, and The EMMES Corp., Rockville, Md......."

http://www.nih.gov/news/health/nov2012/nichd-14.htm

While I understand the need to avoid meat fats, I was not aware of the need to avoid fish fats

Care to elaborate?

Thanks.

Christina

In chemistry it is known that when you mix an oil and water, the oil layer will tend to contain more of the oil soluble materials and the aqueous layer will tend to contain more of the water soluble materials. This known as partitioning. The ratio of the concentration in the upper and lower layers is known as the partition co-efficient, and it is a major factor in designing useful drugs.

OP suggests that oil soluble chlorinated materials such as toxic PCBs are expected to concentrate in fat tissue including that from fish.

You will want to examine to data carefully to decide which fish and grown where. As rivers like the Hudson River are known to have PCB contamination, fresh water fish from some parts of the Hudson are suspect. But salt water fish would seem to be less of a concern.

I was not aware of the need to avoid fish fats


All of the pollutants in the oceans and rivers are stored in fish fat, same as ingested pollutants that are stored in animal--and human--fat. The larger fish have the greatest concentration of pollutants because of their place higher up on the food chain. Fish that eat other fish ingest the pollutants they contain as well, so the large fish--like tuna and swordfish--have the accumulated pollutants of all the smaller fish that have been ingested by the fish they eat for their own food.

That's why fish oil has to be purified--ie, pollutants removed--before being turned into supplements.

That's why the advice is not to eat tuna more than....I forget whether it's once a week, or less.

And that's why the advice is to avoid farmed fish, because of the stuff all too often put into their food to do things like give their meat a nice color so it will appeal to consumers. You wouldn't believe what many of the farmed fish are fed!

Etc etc etc.


sheila

shelia"You wouldn't believe what many of the farmed fish are fed! "

I'll bite. What are the farmed fish fed!

shelia"You wouldn't believe what many of the farmed fish are fed! "

I'll bite. What are the farmed fish fed!

So you'll take the bait! ;-)

There are very high levels of PCBs -- cancer-causing levels. This goes for both fresh and canned. Much of their feed is contaminated, whether it's fish feed or pesticide-laced vegetables that are more recently replacing the harder-to-find fish feed. The fish are also kept in tightly restricted areas in which feces etc build up and contaminate the water they live in. Then there are the food colorants--I forget the specific nature, have to check that--for salmon, for instance, to make the flesh look more pink.

Careful studies have been done. One had been published by the journal Science in 2003 or 2004.

This will give you some idea. http://www.ewg.org/news/farmed-salmon-industry-face-lawsuit-...


sheila

"Sorry Charlie" nothing in the link you provided quantified .. anything!

As a terrified consumer, I would like to see
1-the levels of PCB's that are considered toxic and

2-the levels of PCB's present in wild salmon and farmed salmon. Saying farmed salmon contains 5x wild salmon is meaningless. 5x of next to nothing is still next to nothing.

You still didn't answer the original question, what horrible things are farmed salmon fed?

"Sorry Charlie" nothing in the link you provided quantified .. anything!


It didn't. But I know the EWG's standards and that they base their conclusions very carefully and cautiously on their research and reliable research from other sources. I also don't have time to look for the data at the moment. It's called a deadline.

So when I've finished this article, I'll look things up and let you know, Charlie.


sheila

Taking a break for a few minutes, looking at Medline....

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21898562
organochlorine pesticides (OCPs)


http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21890167
"Polybromodiphenyl ethers (PBDEs) are one of the many toxic chemicals present in the environment and in the food we eat every day, being fish one of the main sources of persistent organic pollutants in our diet; like other lipid-related contaminants, they are of concern since they can bioaccumulate and biomagnify through the trophic chain. We published a study focused on the dietary uptake of dioxins and furans (PCDD/Fs) and dioxin-like polychlorobiphenyls (dl-PCBs) in a set of samples of Spanish farmed turbot (Blanco et al., 2007). In the present paper, we extend the study to PBDEs to provide more information about the uptake and transfer from feed to fish of halogenated contaminants..... Implication in aquaculture management is a need for uncontaminated fish feed to offer safe products."


sheila