FDA: Seafood imports are safe

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Thursday responded to an NBC report questioning the safety of seafood imports. The report, which aired on “Today” and “NBC Nightly News” on Wednesday, claimed both federal and state agencies are repeatedly finding trace amounts of banned substances like chloramphenicol in seafood imports.

The FDA, which declined to be interviewed by NBC, issued a statement after the report aired. In the statement, FDA spokesperson Michael L. Herndon said there is “no imminent health hazard to American consumers,” explaining that the residues detected in seafood are measured in parts per billion or parts per trillion.

The health risks associated with ongoing consumption of residue-tainted seafood concern long-term exposure to antibiotics, including “toxicity-related reactions, carcinogenic and mutagenic potential or increased prevalence of infectivity due to antibiotic-resistant microorganisms.”

Herndon emphasized that there is no acceptable level of any prohibited substance in seafood. The FDA has a testing program for both imported and domestic farmed seafood, and 5 to 7 percent of the samples tested annually contain an unapproved substance, said Herndon, though he did not specify how many samples or how much product the agency collects. The FDA takes a risk-based approach to seafood safety by targeting problematic companies.

Companies caught selling tainted seafood are subject to detention without physical examination, and, as a result, all shipments from these companies are held at the port of entry, explained Herndon. Shipments are released only when these companies can prove that the product complies with FDA regulations.

In farmed seafood, the most frequently detected unapproved animal drugs are chloramphenicol, nitrofurans, fluoroquinolones, malachite green, gentian violet and quinolones (oxolinic acid and flumequine), said Herndon.

The National Fisheries Institute immediately took issue with the NBC report, calling it one-sided. NFI Director of Media Relations Gavin Gibbons identified the investigation’s inaccuracies and questioned the motive of the report. Click here to read Gibbons’ blog on SeafoodSource.

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