魚－是個好鄰居、卻也是危險的食物

Fish: A Good Neighboor, but a Dangerous Food

　
作者 傑奇艾倫‧朱利安諾 博士

滿足於擁有少量財富的生活

尋求高雅但不奢華
精緻但不趕流行
有價值但無須體面
富裕但不一定是有錢
認真求知、安靜思考、輕聲細語、行事率直
以寬闊的心聆聽星鳥、嬰孩和莎草
歡愉地承受一切 勇敢的去做
等待時機　永不匆忙
就是　讓精神無束縛地　自由自在地
在日常中成長
這就是我的交響曲
--威廉‧謙尼

　　美國醫療學會會刊發表了一項研究，建議婦女一個禮拜吃二至四次魚以避免中風危機，然而同時，其它研究卻指出魚可能是我們最危險的食物之一。

　　美國食物與藥物管理局在上個禮拜發出了一個警示：懷孕婦女應該不要吃鯊魚、箭魚、大王鯖魚、魨魚，因為這些魚類可能含有汞金屬足以傷害未出生嬰兒腦部發育。

　　很可惜的是，美國的研究單位並沒有做任何防備，而讓這樣危險及矛盾的資訊在全世界的媒體傳播。好意的準媽媽可能在看到第一份報告後，增加魚的食用量，卻從未看過發佈在各城市報紙上、多如版面補白故事的警訊。

捕釣大嘴鱸魚
（美國魚類與野生物署　照片提供）

　　許多年來，食用魚類從來就不安全。身為污染海域一分子的魚，簡單的呼吸行為與捕食已污染的小魚，讓魚的肉中充滿了毒素。魚讓水流從嘴吧進來由鰓出去以達成呼吸的行為。這些神奇的器官由水中獲取氧氣以維持生物生命。如果這些水像我們許多的海洋、河川與湖水一般被污染，那麼水中的毒素將停留在牠們體內，最後成為牠們血肉的一部份。

　　雖然美國食物與藥物管理局說懷孕婦女可以安心食用最多12盎司煮熟的其它魚類，許多科學家與環境學家卻認為，這樣的量實在太多了。汞被攝取後，足以致命，且幾乎不可避免地造成對中樞神經系統的傷害，產生認知行為發展緩慢與可能智能不足的嬰兒。

　　我懷疑，有多少有注意力缺乏與感覺統合失調現象的孩童，是受汞的毒素影響。根據估計，每年約有六萬的嬰兒因母親食用受汞污染的魚而受感染。

　　以河川水流底部生物為食的魚類，是特別有可能受污染的族群。許多最致命的污染物都沉入水底部 ─ 魚類生長覓食的地方。

海港挖泥工作可能將含汞沈積物混進水裡。
（美國環保署　照片提供）

　　例如，雨水將土地上的化學物質帶入河川、湖泊、海洋，在水體中化學物質依附在簡單的有機體像浮游生物之上。這些化學物質也許不會對單一的微生物構成影響，但一隻小蝦一天可能攝取上百萬有毒的浮游生物。一條一天以數百隻蝦子為食的魚，所將接受的不只是每隻蝦從水中所吸收的化學劑量，還有從蝦所攝取的數百萬有毒的浮游生物而來的擴大的劑量。大一點的魚吃掉小一點的魚，如此類推，直到一隻老鷹或一個人吃了一條鮭魚。那鮭魚含有大量的擴大劑量，而食用這鮭魚的生物必定受到影響。

　　在南加州的聖塔蒙尼卡海灣，食用從海底捕捉的魚類可能會致命。從1949到1979年，洛杉磯每天有１千磅的DDT被倒進海灣中。那些有毒物質，和我們從1930年代開始傾倒的垃圾，仍然留滯在那裡。今日一個巨大的固體廢棄物「甜甜圈」仍躺在聖塔蒙尼卡海灣外的海床上，覆蓋了約兩平方英哩的面積。海流持續地將這些物質帶上海面，毒害海洋生物及做海水浴的人們。美國環保署現正著手進行解決此問題的計劃，但這是不容易的。在此同時，人們持續在受毒害中。

比目魚與比目魚肉
（「永遠新鮮的魚」　照片提供）

　　魚也可以經由其它方式被污染。像比目魚如此受歡迎的魚，因為需求量大，因此有非常嚴格的捕魚限制。在太平洋西北部及阿拉斯加，有些地區，一年只允許短短三個週末的時間捕捉比目魚。這表示，在48到72小時之內，成千的漁船盡力獲取最大漁獲量。當成千上萬的魚在週末結束被帶到岸邊時，加工廠的速度趕不及處理全部漁獲量，於是幾千磅的魚被置放在碼頭上或船上數日、等待著被處理。
有些大漁船會在海上時就先將魚冷凍，但小船無法做到如此。許多的魚在被處理之前，並沒有被保存在適當的狀態下。

　　超級市場裡的魚通常被保存在一個不適當的溫度，且許多隨機取樣顯示，展示櫃裏的魚有相當高的比率不適於食用。但並不是所有被食用的魚都是從野外那些被污染的水域中捕捉來的。今日販售於市場上的魚，有大量的比例是由魚塭培養。這樣的魚比較安全嗎？並不一定。

阿拉斯加的某一條溪裡的野生鮭魚
（圖　美國魚類與野生物署）

　　大衛鈴木基金會在今年稍早提供了一個新證據，顯示加拿大與蘇格蘭養殖的鮭魚，因為受污染的飼料，導致魚肉含有毒性化學物質含量達到危險程度。兩個獨立的研究顯示，像這樣的魚類養殖存在著一個更大的問題。由於捕捉野生鮭魚的有關限制愈來愈多，人們愈加仰賴養殖的鮭魚。該研究顯示，養殖的鮭魚在某些污染物的含量上，是野生魚類的10倍，其中包括多氯聯苯(PCBs)。多氯聯苯早已為人熟知，它會壓制免疫系統功能，使得患者對疾病感染沒有免疫能力。不知何時，我們的政治及工業的領袖，才能將消費者的健康擺在他們每季的利益之前？不知何時，我們的政治人物（通常是最不具資格制定有關健康與安全的法令的人），才能不再屈服於漁業貿易領導團體 ─ 國家漁業會的要求？

　　但最終的選擇仍是在你和我，也就是消費者身上。我們可以選擇看到在消費動物農產品的過程中，既有的危險性。無以計數的研究與死亡已說明，選食來自狀況糟糕的屠宰場的污染肉品，是種不智的行為。每年有數千人因食用在同樣可悲的狀態下被養殖及處理的污染雞肉而死亡。甚至發現，喝牛奶事實上是增加骨質疏鬆的機會，而不是減少。

　　試著從日常飲食中減少動物性食物，而去食用我們地球所提供的大量豐富的植物性食物。你的健康狀況會改善，你的孩子將會安全，而且你將會體驗到，不以另外一個生物的痛苦換得美食，這樣的飲食喜悅。

　　把魚視為你的鄰居，而不是食物。

其它資源

1.隨時提醒自己我們的海洋週期性的破壞http://seawifs.gsfc.nasa.gov/OCEAN_
PLANET/HTML/peril_oil_pollution.
html

2. 點這裡 閱讀西雅圖日報的報導，食品及藥物局（FDA）最近警告四種含汞的魚類。　　

3. 點這裡 閱讀有關汞污染魚影響六萬新生兒的報導。

4.了解消費奶製品與骨質疏鬆之間的關係，參考拯救地球網站: http://www.earthsave.org/ 與約翰‧麥道格健康中心http://www.drmcdougall.com/

5.了解太平洋國際比目魚委員會公佈的比目魚的狀況http://www.iphc.washington.edu/halcom/
default.htm

6.有機消費者協會http://www.organicconsumers.org/
info.htm

7.在你附近的有機食品零售店找出最好的食物。你也可以由此連結找到其它許多有機食物網站 http://www.coopamerica.org/
gp/ 一種供應有機及永續栽培的食物店

8.想要在你的社區給無家可歸及需要的人健康的食物，可參考「食物不是炸彈」這個網頁 http://home.earthlink.
net/~foodnotbombs/

9.有關減少消費動物產品的原因的有趣摘要http://www.essene.com/Essene%20Teachings/Vegetaran.html　

其中包括世界主要宗教的飲食概觀

10.許多幫助消費者消費的資訊在人對動物的倫理治療http://www.essene.com/
Essene%20Teachings/Vegetarian.html

11.找出你的議會民意代表，並傳送e-mail給他們，要求他們堅定立場保護我們的健康。如果你知道自己的郵遞區號，可以由此網址找到他們http://www.visi.com/juan/congress/
ziptoit.html　
州政府http://www.webslingerz.com/
jhoffman/congress-email.html
也可在此找到你的民意代表http://congress.nw.dc.us/innovate/
index.html

傑奇艾倫‧朱利安諾 博士是在西雅圖的一個老師及作家。你會發現他正在思考著，到底有多少從海裡迴游的鮪魚，來到這兒遭受汞污染的地方溪流產卵。你可以將你的想法、評論、及觀點告訴他jackie@healingourworld.com　或參觀他的網頁http://www.healingourworld.com/

原文與圖片詳見：http://www.ens.lycos.com/ens/jan2001/
2001L-01-19g.html

版權歸屬Environment News Service(ENS)，環境信託協會　（徐怡德 譯，李欣哲、蔡麗伶 審校）

中英對照全文：http://news.ngo.org.tw/issue/surround/
2001/issue-surround01052401.htm

　
By Jackie Alan Giuliano, Ph.D.

To live content with small means,
to seek elegance rather than luxury,
and refinement rather than fashion,
to be worthy, not respectable, and
wealthy, not rich,
to study hard, think quietly, talk gently,act frankly,
to listen to stars and birds, babes and sages, with open heart,
to bear all cheerfully,
do all bravely,
await occasions,
hurry never,
in a word, to let the spiritual, unbidden 
and unconscious,
grow up through the common.
This is to be my symphony.
-- William Ellery Channing

At the same time that the "Journal of the American Medical Association" has published a study recommending that women eat fish two to four times a week to cut the risk of stroke, other studies are suggesting that fish may be one of our most dangerous foods.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration released a warning last week that pregnant women should not eat shark, swordfish, king mackerel, and tilefish because they could contain enough mercury to harm an unborn baby𠏋 developing brain. 

Sadly, America research system does nothing to prevent such damaging and conflicting information from being carried in the media worldwide. Well meaning mothers-to-be may find the first study and increase their fish consumption while never seeing the warning, which was published in many cities's newspapers, buried as a filler story.

Fishing for largemouth bass
(Photo courtesy U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service (USFWS))

Eating fish has not been safe for many years. As dwellers in our polluted oceans, fish absorb toxic substances into their flesh by eating smaller fish that are contaminated and by the simple act of breathing. A fish breathes by letting water stream into its mouth and through its gills. Those miraculous organs take oxygen from the water to sustain the creatures life. If the water is polluted, as many of our oceans, lakes and streams are, then those toxic substances become resident in their bodies, eventually becoming part of their flesh.

Although the U.S. Food and Drug Administration says that up to 12 ounces of other kinds of cooked fish can be eaten safely by pregnant women, many other scientists and environmentalists think that this is too much. Mercury is a deadly chemical when ingested and nearly always results in damage to the central nervous system, producing babies with slower cognitive development skills and possibly brain damage.

I wonder how many of our children with attention deficit disorder or other cognitive dysfunction have been affected by mercury poisoning? It is estimated that 60,000 babies born each year are effected by mercury poisioning from their mothers eating contaminated fish. 

Fish that feed on the bottoms of our waterways are particularly susceptible to contamination. Many of the deadliest pollutants sink to the bottom of bodies of water where these fish live and feed.

For example, rain carries the chemicals from the land into the rivers, lakes and oceans where the chemicals lodge in the bodies of simple organisms such as plankton. The chemicals may not affect a single microscopic organism, but a small shrimp may consume millions of the poisoned plankton in a day. A fish who eats many hundreds of the shrimp in a day will then receive not only the chemical dose that each shrimp absorbed from the water, but the magnified dose from the millions of plankton consumed by the shrimp as well. Another fish eats the smaller fish and so on until, for example, an eagle - or a human - eats a salmon. That salmon contains a hugely magnified dose of the poison, which will invariably affect the animal eating it.

In Santa Monica Bay in Southern California, bottom dwelling fish that are caught and eaten can be deadly. Between 1949 and 1979, Los Angeles dumped 1,000 pounds of DDT per day into the Bay. That poison, along with the rest of the waste we have been dumping since the 1930s, is still out there. Today, a huge solid waste "doughnut" rests on the ocean floor off Santa Monica Bay, covering two square miles. Ocean currents continually bring this material up, poisoning sea life and bathers. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is embarking on a plan to address this problem, but it is tricky. In the meantime, people are being poisoned.

Fish are contaminated in other ways as well. Popular fish such as halibut are in so much demand that very restrictive fishing limits have been established. In the Pacific Northwest and Alaska, some areas allow only a brief three weekends per year to catch halibut. This means that for a 48 to 72 hour period, thousands of fishing boats are catching as much halibut as they can. When these hundreds of thousands of fish are brought to shore at the end of the weekend, the processing plants cannot keep up, so thousands of pounds of fish sit on the docks or in boats for days waiting their turn. 

Some large factory boats freeze the fish at sea, but the smaller boats cannot. Much of the fish is not in very good shape by the time it is processed. 

Fish in supermarkets are often kept at improper temperatures and many random tests have shown that a significant percentage of the fish in that display case are not fit for consumption.

But not all fish eaten are caught wild from our polluted waterways. A large proportion of the fish marketed today is raised on farms. Is that fish any safer? Not necessarily. 

Wild salmon in an Alaskan stream 
(Photo courtesy USFWS)

New evidence released earlier this year by the David Suzuki Foundation suggests that farmed salmon from Canada and Scotland contain dangerous levels of toxic chemicals from contaminated feed. Two independent studies suggest a much larger problem may exist for fish raised in this way. With the growing restrictions on wild caught salmon, people are relying on farmed fish more and more. The study found that the farmed salmon had as much as 10 times the levels of some pollutants, including polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) than wild fish. PCBs have long been known to suppress the immune system, leaving the victims open to a variety of diseases.

When will our political and industry leaders put the health of consumers ahead of their quarterly profits? When will politicians, often the least qualified people to be making rules on health and safety, stop bending to the wishes of the National Fisheries Institute, the nation leading fish industry trade group?

But the ultimate choice rests with the consumers, you and I. We can choose to see the inherent dangers in consuming animal products. Countless studies and countless deaths have illustrated the folly of eating contaminated meat from the horrible conditions in slaughterhouses. Thousands die each year from eating poisoned chicken raised and processed in equally deplorable conditions. Even drinking milk has been shown to actually increase the risk of osteoporosis, not decrease it. 

Try eliminating animal foods from your diet and experience the rich array of plant foods our world has to offer. Your health will improve, your children will be safe, and you will experience the joy of eating a meal that was not brought to you through the suffering of another creature. 　

Consider fish your neighbors, not your meal.

RESOURCES

1. Be reminded of the routine destruction of our oceans at:
http://seawifs.gsfc.nasa.gov/
OCEAN_PLANET/HTML/
peril_oil_pollution.html

2. Read about the recent FDA warning about mercury in four types of fish in the "Seattle Times" by clicking here.

3. Read about the 60,000 newborns affected by mercury from contaminated fish by clicking here.

4. Learn about the connection between consuming dairy products and osteoporosis at Earthsave at: http://www.earthsave.org/ and through the John McDougall Wellness Center at: http://www.drmcdougall.com/

5. Learn about the situation with halibut from the International Pacific Halibut Commission at: http://www.iphc.washington.edu/
halcom/default.htm 

6. Check out the Organic Consumers Association at: http://www.organicconsumers.org/info.htm

7. Look for food co-ops near you for the best in food. You can find a listing for many at the Co-Op America Green Pages Online at: http://www.coopamerica.org/gp/ 

8. Want to feed the homeless and needy in your community wholesome foods? Visit the Food Not Bombs webpage at:http://home.earthlink.net/
~foodnotbombs/ and learn how

9. An interesting summary of compelling reasons to reduce the consumption of animal products can be found at: http://www.essene.com/Essene%20Teachings/Vegetarian.html. It includes an overview of the eating practices of the world's major religious groups.

10. Many resources to help the consumer can be found at the web site of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals at:
http://www.essene.com/Essene%20Teachings/Vegetarian.html

11. Find out who your Congressional representatives are and e-mail them. Demand that they stay strong and work harder to protect our health, the environment and animal rights. If you know your Zip code, you can find them at: http://www.visi.com/
juan/congress/ziptoit.html or you can search by state at:http://www.webslingerz.com/
jhoffman/congress-email.html. You can also find your representatives at:http://congress.nw.dc.us/innovate/
index.html

[Jackie Alan Giuliano, Ph.D. is a writer and teacher in Seattle. He can be found wondering how many of the salmon returning from the sea to spawn in local streams are contaminated with mercury. Please send your thoughts, comments, and visions to him at jackie@healingourworld.com and visit his website at http://www.healingourworld.com/