Toxins seafood

Seafood Toxins. Vktually scores of fish and shellfish species have been reported to have toxic manifestations. Most of these toxicities have been shown to be microbiological ki origin. There are a few, however, that are natural components of seafoods. 

Clinical Aspects of Marine Seafood Toxin Syndromes... 

In general, the clinical presentation of the human diseases associated with the ingestion of marine seafood toxins is similar to that of any other food poisoning disease. However, a number of clinical issues make these diseases particularly difficult to diagnose and treat. For example, the neurotoxic syndromes associated with CFP, PSP, and NSP represent points along a continuum of disease severity rather than clinically exclusive diseases. Even if fish or other seafood is the suspected source of a disease outbreak, diarrhea associated with the outbreak could be misdiagnosed as originating from bacterial rather than from phycotoxin contamination. 

Diseases associated with marine seafood toxins appear to have high attack rates. An attack rate is the proportion of a well-defined population that develops a disease over a specific period of time (where the numerator is the number of new cases during that period and the denominator is the size of the population at risk, e.g., the number of people who ate a contaminated food at the start of the time period of interest) (Goodman and Peavy, 1996). Physicians therefore need to ask about disease cases among people sharing the same seafood meal. 

Fleming, L., et ah. Seafood toxin diseases Issues in epidemiology and community outreach, in Reguera, B., et al., eds.. Harmful Algae, Xunta de Galacia and Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission of UNESCO, 1998. 

Hokama, Y., An enzyme immunoassay for the detection of ciguatoxin and competive inhibition by related natural polyether toxins, in Seafood Toxins, Ragelis, E., ed., American Chemical Society, Washington, D.C., 1984. 

Todd, E., Amnesic shellfish poisoning - a new seafood toxin syndrome, in Graneli, E., ed.. Toxic Marine Phytoplankton, Elsevier Science Publishing, 1990b. 

Todd, E., Emerging diseases associated with seafood toxins and other water-borne agents. Arm. N.Y. Acad. Sci., 740, 77, 1994. 

In recent years, strong evidence of an increase in the magnitude, duration, and geographical distribution of food-borne illnesses caused by seafood toxins has been presented. The effect can be seen in the form of impediments to the development, growth, and stability of the local and commercial seafood industries in various areas of the world—most noticeably throughout the tropics where an abundant, accessible seafood resource resides. 

It is fitting that this volume commemorates the 75th anniversary of the Agricultural and Food Division of the American Chemical Society, dedicated to the knowledge and use of world food resources. I hope it will serve to summon immediate attention and bring rapid solutions to the problems posed by seafood toxins. To all those who contributed I express my sincere gratitude. 

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