Are You a Seafood Lover? Use These Tips to Stay Healthy
Aside from the fraud issue, which is clearly prevalent, most major waterways in the world are contaminated with mercury, heavy metals, and chemicals like dioxins, PCBs, and other agricultural chemicals that wind up in the environment. This is why, as a general rule, I no longer recommend getting your omega-3 requirements from fish, but rather from a high-quality, animal-based omega-3 supplement like krill oil. However, I do make two exceptions.
One is authentic, wild-caught Alaskan sockeye salmon, the nutritional benefits of which I believe still outweigh any potential contamination. The risk of sockeye accumulating high amounts of mercury and other toxins is reduced because of its short life cycle, which is only about three years. Additionally, bioaccumulation of toxins is also reduced by the fact that it doesn't feed on other, already contaminated, fish.
Whenever I consume fish, I make sure to also take chlorella tablets. The chlorella is a potent mercury binder and if taken with the fish will help bind the mercury before you are able to absorb it, so it can be safely excreted in your stool.
The second exception is smaller fish with short lifecycles, which also tend to be better alternatives in terms of fat content, so it's a win-win situation - lower contamination risk and higher nutritional value. A general guideline is that the closer to the bottom of the food chain the fish is, the less contamination it will have accumulated. So if you're a seafood lover, try to choose most of your fish from this group, which includes:
- Sardines
- Anchovies
- Herring
If you insist on eating typical, store-bought fish and want to know more about the extent of your mercury exposure, I urge you to check out the online mercury calculator6 at GotMercury.org to get an idea of the risks. Additionally, as mentioned above, you may want to consider taking a natural mercury chelator with any fish dinner. In addition to chlorella, this also includes zeolite (green clay) and fermented vegetables. Since larger fish tend to live longer and have the highest contamination levels, they should be avoided entirely. These include (please note this is not an exhaustive listing):
| Tuna (tuna steaks, sushi, and canned) | Sea bass and largemouth bass | Marlin |
| Halibut | Pike | Walleye |
| Shark | Sword fish | White croaker |
Read more: http://www.healthy-holistic-living.com/59-percent-of-the-tuna-americans-eat-is-not-tuna.html#ixzz2hegdtVAo
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