THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: A new incident of suspected marine toxin contamination in fish has raised concerns food safety monitoring in the state as 25 people fell ill in Aryanad last week after consuming red snapper purchased from a local market.
The incident comes just months after a major food poisoning incident in Vizhinjam, where investigations had pointed to the presence of marine toxins in seafood. The recurrence of a similar incident has triggered questions about the preparedness of the fisheries department and the food safety department to detect and prevent toxin-contaminated fish from reaching consumers.
Food safety officials said all those affected had consumed the fish bought from the Aryanad market. They developed symptoms including severe diarrhoea, abdominal pain and complications like numbness and paralysis-like sensations in the lower limbs.
A food safety official said the symptoms are similar to the earlier incidents in the Vizhinjam food poisoning case. “Today also we collected more samples of the fish and they will be sent for further scrutiny at the Central Institute of Fisheries Technology. Our laboratories are not equipped to trace marine toxins,” said the official.
“We suspect the presence of naturally occurring marine toxins which can accumulate in large predatory reef fish through the marine food chain. During an earlier investigation involving a similar fish species, laboratory analysis had reportedly detected ciguatoxin, a biotoxin associated with algae consumed by fish,” the official added.
However, officials stressed that the exact cause of the latest incident can only be confirmed after laboratory results are received.
The fisheries department has also launched an inquiry. Fisheries joint director Satheesh Kumar said the department would investigate the incident jointly with food safety authorities.”We need to determine whether the illness was caused by marine toxins, preservatives, spoilage or some other factor. We will initiate interventions based on the lab report,” he said.
In February, two members of a family died in a suspected case of food poisoning, after consuming seafood at a hotel in Vizhinjam and later lab reports found the presence of marine toxins in the seafood.