Dolphin meat for sale in Taiji. |
|
|
Dolphin meat sold to the Japanese people is highly contaminated with mercury, methylmercury, cadmium, DDT and PCBs. The Japanese government provides no warning that eating dolphin meat poses a serious health hazard.
Coalition member Elsa Nature Conservancy (ENC) of Japan is reporting that dolphin meat from a dolphin capture in Futo was highly contaminated with mercury. ENC acquired a slice of meat from a bottlenose dolphin that was butchered in Futo on November 11, 2004. ENC sent the sample to Hokkaido where Dr. Tetsuya Endo of the Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Health Science University of Hokkaido examined it for mercury contamination.
|
The dolphin meat was found to be highly polluted, containing 19.2ppm (parts per million) of mercury. This is 48 times higher than the maximum advisory level of 0.4ppm, set by the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry of Japan.
In 2002 and 2003 ENC sent several packages of dolphin meat from Miyagi prefecture to the local governmental Inspecting Center of Public Health in Ibaraki Prefecture and Dr. Tetsuya Endo at the Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Health Science University of Hokkaido. The dolphin meat had been sold in Ito City and in a town named Kawazu, located in the southern part of Izu peninsula, Shizuoka prefecture. The inspection by both the Inspection Center and Dr. Endo proved that all of the meat was contaminated by mercury.
One package of dolphin meat showed as much as 5.69ppm of mercury, which is 14.2 times higher than the maximum advisory level. The supermarkets in Ito city stopped selling dolphin meat for a considerable time in 2003.
Hundreds of samples tested
International teams of scientists working in Japan have analyzed hundreds of samples of whale and dolphin meat and reported their findings to the International Whaling Commission. They found that more than 90% of the samples exceeded limits for one or more pollutants. One sample had more than 1,600 times the permitted level of mercury. The average level of mercury was more than 5 times the maximum allowable level, while the average concentration of methyl mercury was four times the maximum level.
We believe it is important to publicize this health hazard.
The fishermen of Taiji and the Government of Japan know that the dolphin meat is highly contaminated but have done nothing about it.
What you can do:
Please send a message to the Japanese Prime Minister and to the Embassy of Japan in Washington D.C., warning them that the contaminated dolphin meat poses a serious health hazard to the Japanese people:
The Prime Minister of Japan
Mr. Yasuo Fukuda, Prime Minister of Japan:
Fax: +81-3-3581-3883
E-mail: www.kantei.go.jp/foreign/forms/comment.html
Embassy of Japan in Washington D.C.
Ambassador Ryozo Kato
2520 Massachusetts Ave., N.W.
Washington D.C. 20008-2869
Tel: (202) 238-6700,
Fax: 202-328-2187
Hours: M-F 9:15-12:30 and 2:00-6:16
E-mail: jicc@embjapan.org
www.us.emb-japan.go.jp
|
