Farmed Fish Raises A Conundrum

As most of you already know, I strongly advise that you do not eat farmed fish for many reasons of which pollution and disease is among the many reasons for not doing so.

I of course am not alone in this position and fish farmers, not being stupid, know this, and many are experimenting with ways to overcome the shortcomings of fish farming and I hope they succeed.

Solving the problem will not be easy, for example, in a recent report by the Associated Press out of Munich, Germany, on a farm raised fish study, a problem arose resulting in a heart-cancer conundrum.

Heart health benefits from fish such as salmon and mackerel are weakened when farm raised fish are fed vegetable oil instead of fish oil raising the belief that these fish should be fed more fish oil.

However, other studies have shown that fish oil raises the pollution level in farmed fish increasing the risk of cancer. This has encouraged some fish farmers to move to vegetable oil pellets which then decrease the heart benefits, and so the conundrum, which way do you go?

Wild fatty fish, on the other hand, such as salmon, tuna, mackerel, sardines and herring do not create a conundrum. They are rich in the heart healthy omega-3 fatty acids which lowers bad cholesterol and triglycerides, and helps to slow the growth of plaque, without the threat of cancer causing pollutants.

In modern day fish farming, the fish are fed pellets with natural fish oil and vegetable oil. (I'd like to point out that our vegetables oils are refined to death with chemicals and heat and have no nutritional value and it's like consuming liquid plastic.)

And because of a U.S. based study earlier this year showing a high level of dioxins and other potentially cancer-causing pollutants in farm-raised salmon, many of the farmers vowed to move toward pellets with vegetable oil.

Not a good idea says Norwegian scientists at the annual meeting of the European Society of Cardiology.

Their study showed an improvement in the health of the blood of people who ate one meal every day for six weeks, of farmed fish that were only fed fish oil. With farmed fish, consumed in the same amount over the same time frame, that was fed vegetable oil or 50% vegetable and 50% fish oil, there was no improvement at all.

The scientists, led by Dr. Harold Arneson of Ulleval University Hospital in Norway, tested the blood from the volunteers for concentrations of omega-3 fatty acids and changes in blood chemicals linked to heart disease.

So what am I telling you? I'm telling you that until a solution is found to producing healthy farmed fish and keeping fish farms from polluting our oceans, (which is does, and has an adverse effect on wild fish), we should not buy farmed fish, and fish farms should be shut down.

Voting with your dollar is the strongest way of making yourself heard, and, in this case, protecting your health and the health of our oceans as well.

To Your Good Health And Longevity!

Ira Marxe
CEO, Good Health Supplement

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Article by Ira Marxe of AntiAgingLifeExtension.com featuring Good Health Supplements dedicated to offering you affordable, leading edge technology in healthy heart support, breakthrough anti-aging, superior multi-vitamin, invaluable digestive supplementation and more!

Read past Health Matter Minutes articles and consumer reports:

Farmed Fish Raises A Conundrum

Health Matters Minutes Article Sep 3, 2004

Health Matters
Minutes Article
Sep 3, 2004