If you are unsure of the type of tuna you are eating, it is best to go with the overall average value in our tuna fish calculator (0.450 ppm) to be safe. Another good reason to avoid bluefin? It is an endangered species. ![]() ![]() However, bigeye and especially bluefin should be avoided as they are high mercury fish. Fresh skipjack, yellowfin, and albacore are all within acceptable mid-ranges for moderate consumption. If you are eating fresh or frozen tuna, the species can have a big difference. Thankfully, canned "light tuna" has a fairly low mercury level, whereas canned "white tuna" falls in the mid-range. An official website of the United States government. This article discusses poisoning from mercury. Canned tuna is the most commonly consumed type of tuna. This article discusses poisoning from mercury. Thankfully, this calculator functions as a tuna fish calculator for mercury, as we have included several different species. However, not all tuna are equal when it comes to mercury. What fish are high in mercury? Mercury levels in fishĪs you will soon see, we chose tuna for our sample calculation below, and this is because tuna is the #3 most consumed seafood in the Unites States after shrimp and salmon. By the time a tuna eats its prey, it has consumed levels of methylmercury orders of magnitude higher than the surrounding environment. However, exposure to methyl mercury from fish consumption is generally so low that it is difficult to measure any potential adverse health effects. ![]() Basically, methylmercury diffuses into phytoplankton, which are consumed by zooplankton, then by small fish, a larger fish, and so on. The health effects of mercury exposure depend on its chemical form (elemental, inorganic or organic), the route of exposure (inhalation, ingestion or skin contact), and the level of exposure. So, how does mercury get into the fish? While methylmercury levels are low in the ecosystem itself, it bioaccumulates in larger fish that have consumed many smaller fish. Aside from these sources of mercury, there are also areas of the world that have significantly higher levels of methylmercury due to point source pollution by chemical plants. However, mercury does not get incorporated into the food chain until it is methylated by aquatic microbes and becomes methylmercury. Mercury is naturally found in the earth’s ocean and crust, but a big portion of the mercury in the ocean comes from burning fossil fuels, which is transferred from the atmosphere to oceans, ponds, and lakes by rain. The form of mercury that we are talking about is actually methylmercury, which comes from both human and natural sources.
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