Blue shark: Risk/benefits of its consumption
Keywords:
blue shark, contamination, heavy metals, mercury bioaccumulation, MexicoAbstract
The blue shark is one of the most abundant sharks worldwide and one of the most captured. Its meat has a high nutritional value, however, being a large species, with a high trophic level, long-lived and highly migratory, it is very susceptible to accumulate toxic elements in its tissues. Several researchers have found mercury concentrations above the maximum permissible limit for human consumption (1.0 mg/Kg) in the muscle of adult organisms of this species. However, others have reported values that do not represent a risk to the population. Even if the concentration of mercury is below the maximum limit established for safe consumption, in coastal regions the most appropriate scenario would be for consumption to be limited weekly, keeping it to a minimum fundamentally in children and pregnant women, which are the sectors of the population most vulnerable to the effects of mercury bioaccumulation.
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