Canned tuna tests safe

by Nicole Weston, Posted Jan 23rd 2006 @ 9:35PM

Canned tuna has been tested safe by the FDA. After hearing increasing warnings about the levels of mercury in seafoods - particularly canned tuna - the United States Tuna Foundation (USTF) has reported that Food and Drug Administration tests have proven that canned tuna contains less mercury than the national allowance. It is recommended that no more than 1 part per million (ppm) of mercury should be consumed daily, and the canned tuna tested averaged 0.12 ppm, approximately 8 times less than the limit for commercial fish. The USTF director, David Burney, said that the "FDA's latest findings about mercury levels in canned tuna should end the debate over whether canned tuna is a safe and healthy food for all Americans. No one is at risk from the minute amounts of mercury in any form of canned tuna."

Tuna is high in omega-3 fatty acids and is an excellent source of lean protein. It is also a good source of a variety of minerals and nutrients, including selenium, magnesium, potassium, niacin, folic acid, B1 and B6. The national dietary guidelines and organizations such as the American Heart Association advocate eating at least two servings of fish per week, and canned tuna is perhaps the most convenient way of having it.

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Filed Under: Science, Business, Ingredients
Tags: canned fish, fatty acit, fda, fish, food and drug administration, healthy food, lean protein, mercury, mercury levels, omega 3, protein, safe, testing, tuna, tuna foundation, united states, usda, ustf, vitamins

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Reader comments (Page 1 of 1)

1-23-2006 @10:21PM Ken Sloan said... I've always thought that the mercury scare was going to turn up something like the cholesterol in eggs debate. This isn't quite the same, but it still allows me to eat 7 cans of tuna a day without having to worry about whether or not I'm poisoning myself. Good news!
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1-24-2006 @11:32AM Marc said... This test result is not as clean as it looks. Mercury poisoning is about the mass of mercury that you consume, not the concentration of mercury in your food. The 2nd link in the post above has some important calculations which show how a 45 lb child could consume more than the EPA recommended limit by eating 6 ounces of tuna per week (they use 0.31 ppm in the example, but using 0.12 ppm also surpasses the limit). Pregnant women and small children should perform the calculations and determine what level is safe for their body size.

For example, EPA's methylmercury reference dose is 0.1 micrograms/kg body weight per day, so if Ken Sloan (the commenter above) weighs 75 kg, he can consume up to 7.5 micrograms per day. A 170 g can of tuna contains 20.4 micrograms of mercury (170 g * 0.12 ppm), which is far above the 7.5 microgram recommendation. So you might want to doublecheck the standards and do your own calculations before going feasting on canned tuna (note that it is not clear how much of the 0.12 ppm is methylmercury, which is a particularly toxic mercury compound)
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1-29-2006 @9:43PM Steven Silvers said... There's more on this at Scatterbox in a post titled, �FDA tuna safety study study creates fishy contradictions.� Could someone explain in plain English what the FDA study found and which side � the tuna industry or some news media � is misrepresenting it?

http://www.stevensilvers.com/2006/01/fda_tuna_safety.html

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