WASHINGTON – More than one-third of the nation’s lakes and nearly one-fourth of its rivers contain fish that may be contaminated with mercury, dioxin, PCBs and pesticide pollution, the Environmental Protection Agency says.
The EPA released a list of advisories issued by states that monitor lakes and rivers for pollution levels affecting fish caught during recreational and sport fishing but not deep-sea commercial fishing.
“It’s about trout, not tuna. It’s about what you catch on the shore, not what you buy off the shelf,” EPA Administrator Mike Leavitt said Tuesday. “This is about the health of pregnant mothers and small children; that’s the primary focus of our concern.”
Leavitt emphasized that monitoring by state officials is increasing, while pollution levels, particularly from mercury, have begun to drop.
But he also said that nearly every time state officials check for pollution, they find it, meaning that eventually almost the entire United States could have fish advisories.
Leavitt said emissions of mercury from human activities dropped 45 percent from 1990 to 1999, but he did not provide more recent figures. Pollution from mercury comes from industry such as coal-fired power plants, the burning of hazardous and medical waste, and production of chlorine. It also occurs naturally in the environment.
“I want to make clear that this agency views mercury as a toxin. Manmade emissions need to be reduced and regulated. There has been an appropriate, heightened public concern,” Leavitt said.
This year, 44 states have issued fish advisories for mercury, a persistent substance that can affect the nervous system. Two more states, Montana and Washington, added statewide advisories to warn of the potential for widespread contamination of fish.
The EPA national list for 2003 shows 48 states issued 3,094 advisories because of polluted fish. Two states, Wyoming and Alaska, had no such monitoring.
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