Well, this is scary - aquaculture and antibiotic resistance

[GotGarlic]

How Antibiotic-Tainted Seafood From China Ends Up on Your Table

You might want to pass on the shrimp cocktail.

From the air, the Pearl River Delta in southern China’s Guangdong province resembles a mass of human cells under a microscope. Hundreds of thousands of tiny rectangular blocks, all of them shades of green, are clustered between cities and waterways. Livestock pens are scattered among the thousands of seafood farms that form the heart of the country’s aquaculture industry, the largest in the world.

Beside one of those fish farms near Zhaoqing, on a muggy day in June, a farmhand wearing a broad-brimmed straw hat hoses down the cement floor of a piggery where white and roan hogs sniff and snort. The dirty water from the pens flows into a metal pipe, which empties directly into a pond shared by dozens of geese. As the yellowish-brown water splashes from the pipe, tilapia flap and jump, hungry for an afternoon feeding.

Chinese agriculture has thrived for thousands of years on this kind of recycling—the nutrients that fatten the pigs and geese also feed the fish. But the introduction of antibiotics into animal feed has transformed ecological efficiency into a threat to global public health...

In November 2015 scientists reported the discovery of a colistin-resistant gene in China that can turn a dozen or more types of bacteria into superbugs. Since then the gene has been found in patients, food, and environmental samples in more than 20 countries, including at least four patients in the U.S. Food, it now appears, can be a crucial vector. “People eating their shrimp cocktails and paella may be getting more than they bargained for,” says Dr. Martin Blaser, a professor of microbiology and an infectious diseases physician at New York University Langone Medical Center who chairs President Barack Obama’s advisory panel for combating antibiotic-resistant bacteria. “The penetration of antibiotics through the food chain is a big problem.”

Research has found that as much as 90 percent of the antibiotics administered to pigs pass undegraded through their urine and feces. This has a direct impact on farmed seafood. The waste from the pigpens at the Jiangmen farm flowing into the ponds, for example, exposes the fish to almost the same doses of medicine the livestock get—and that’s in addition to the antibiotics added to the water to prevent and treat aquatic disease outbreaks. The fish pond drains into a canal connected to the West River, which eventually empties into the Pearl River estuary, on which sit Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Hong Kong, and Macau. The estuary receives 193 metric tons (213 tons) of antibiotics a year, Chinese scientists estimated in 2013."

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/feat...nted-seafood-from-china-ends-up-on-your-table

 

[medtran49]

That's one of the reasons we don't buy farmed seafood of any kind, much less from Asian countries.

 

[GotGarlic]

That's one of the reasons we don't buy farmed seafood of any kind, much less from Asian countries.

It's my understanding that the aquaculture farms, especially the indoor ones, in the U.S. are safe - they don't use antibiotics and are able to filter the water very well. But yeah - anything from Asia is off my list.

 

[Dawgluver]

No Asia for me either. But I always wonder if even the products labeled "wild caught" here are actually that.

 

[GotGarlic]

No Asia for me either. But I always wonder if even the products labeled "wild caught" here are actually that.

I do, too. A Fb friend who likes to post her dinner pix once posted one with "wild-caught local tilapia." I questioned it but all she would say is she prefers wild-caught fish. I don't know where in the world anyone catches tilapia in the wild, much less in the U.S.

 

[medtran49]

It's my understanding that the aquaculture farms, especially the indoor ones, in the U.S. are safe - they don't use antibiotics and are able to filter the water very well. But yeah - anything from Asia is off my list.

Your perogative, I'll pass.

 

[Dawgluver]

I actually met the tilapia being raised by our local FFA kids. Their tank was impeccably clean, and their feed was antibiotic-free. I'd eat those. Probably not tilapia from anywhere else.

I get wild-caught Louisiana shrimp from the US (at least I hope so, that's what the bag says) and wild caught US scallops.

 

[GotGarlic]

Your perogative, I'll pass.

I didn't say I buy it... Just passing on what I've read about it.

 

[Caslon]

Ocean caught shrimp from most parts of Southeast Asia were deemed "unsafe" years ago by the US. That's what pushed the shrimp industry there to go to "shrimp farming". Is that article saying "farmed" shrimp is now suspect? Don't they filter the water? Maybe not so thoroughly.

I miss BBQ'ing fresh caught flash frozen SE Asian tiger shrimp 20 years ago. The texture was firm. Farmed jumbo shrimp is blubbery.

That area of sea has tiny parts of every auto and computer we own, in it, more than usual.

 

[powerplantop]

I do, too. A Fb friend who likes to post her dinner pix once posted one with "wild-caught local tilapia." I questioned it but all she would say is she prefers wild-caught fish. I don't know where in the world anyone catches tilapia in the wild, much less in the U.S.

They are native to Africa and the Middle East.

They are a invasive species but can be caught in Florida.

Wild caught tilapia is actually good. But the farm raised stuff from China has no flavor and is mushy.

 

[CraigC]

They are native to Africa and the Middle East.

They are a invasive species but can be caught in Florida.

Wild caught tilapia is actually good. But the farm raised stuff from China has no flavor and is mushy.

Not many folks in South Florida eat any WC freshwater fish. Run off from sugar and sod farms have added mercury to the water. The levels are such, that more than an occasional meal of WC fish could cause mercury poisoning.

 

[powerplantop]

Not many folks in South Florida eat any WC freshwater fish. Run off from sugar and sod farms have added mercury to the water. The levels are such, that more than an occasional meal of WC fish could cause mercury poisoning.

http://www.floridahealth.gov/progra...-consumption/_documents/advisory-brochure.pdf

 

[buckytom]

and wild caught US scallops.

That struck me as funny, both "wild" scallops, and that they are caught.

Like they are wild little party animals that you have to chase after, with their hootin' and hollerin' and knocking stuff over as they try to get away.

I've been watching too much Spongebob again, haven't I?

 

[Dawgluver]

That struck me as funny, both "wild" scallops, and that they are caught.

Like they are wild little party animals that you have to chase after, with their hootin' and hollerin' and knocking stuff over as they try to get away.

I've been watching too much Spongebob again, haven't I?

Quick little suckers. You have to move fast, and bring them another shot of tequila.

 

[msmofet]

That struck me as funny, both "wild" scallops, and that they are caught.

Like they are wild little party animals that you have to chase after, with their hootin' and hollerin' and knocking stuff over as they try to get away.

I've been watching too much Spongebob again, haven't I?

Yes you are.

Quick little suckers. You have to move fast, and bring them another shot of tequila.

Does anyone remember the cartoon with the shrimps with the saddles on?

 

[CraigC]

http://www.floridahealth.gov/progra...-consumption/_documents/advisory-brochure.pdf

I put those recommendations, being produced by the Florida gov, in the same category as their claim that the Python problem in the Everglades was caused by people letting their pets loose. 100% BS! Just look up Jeb Bush and citrus canker.