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By Emily Petsko
For many, the end of October evokes images of falling leaves or Halloween's ghosts and ghouls. But those of us focused on oceans also know October as National Seafood Month.
By Heather Cruickshank
Trillions of bacteria and other microbes live in the human digestive system. Together, they form a community that's known as the gut microbiota.
Many bacteria in the microbiota play important roles in human health, helping to metabolize food, strengthen intestinal integrity and protect against disease.
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By Bret Stetka
Glaciers continue to melt. Sea levels are on the rise. And now scientists believe the changing climate may put our brains at risk. A new analysis predicts that by 2100, increasing water temperatures brought on by a warming planet could result in 96 percent of the world's population not having access to an omega-3 fatty acid crucial to brain health and function.
Tuna auctions are a tourist spectacle in Tokyo. Outside the city's most famous fish market, long queues of visitors hoping for a glimpse of the action begin to form at 5 a.m. The attraction is so popular that last October the Tsukiji fish market, in operation since 1935, moved out from the city center to the district of Toyosu to cope with the crowds.
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Scientists continue to uncover more ways climate change poses a threat to our health, such as the spread of tropical diseases northward and the loss of crucial nutrients in crops. Now, researchers at Harvard have added another risk to that list: increased neurotoxins in seafood.
Yes, Flesh-Eating Bacteria Are in the Warm Coastal Waters – but It Doesn’t Mean You’ll Get Sick
Cover all open wounds with waterproof bandages before swimming in the ocean. lzf / iStock / Getty Images Plus
By Brian Labus
Like humans, many bacteria like to spend time at the beach. The so-called flesh-eating bacteria, Vibrio vulnificus, don't just like the beach; they need it, and rely on sea salt for survival. And as with human beachgoers, the warmer the water, the more of them there are.
By Grantly Galland
The North Pacific Fisheries Commission (NPFC) works to ensure that high-seas fishing for Pacific chub mackerel, Pacific saury, two squid species and other stocks across the north Pacific Ocean is legal, transparent and sustainable. The Pew Charitable Trusts shares those goals and will for the first time attend the commission's annual meeting, July 11-18 in Tokyo, as a formal observer.
Flesh-Eating Bacteria Incidents Reported, Experts Warn Warming Oceans Could Make It More Common
Within the last month, at least two people in the U.S. have contracted a flesh-eating infection from an ocean-dwelling bacterium — an occurrence that experts warn could become more frequent as the world's oceans warm.
Vibrio vulnificus is an "opportunistic pathogen" responsible for a majority of seafood-related deaths in the U.S., according to an article written by the American Society for Microbiology. The bacteria thrive in warm salty and brackish waters and enter humans either through breaks in the skin or after being consumed with raw seafood. Up to one-third of people with vibrio vulnificus will die from the infection, which can cause a flesh-eating and commonly fatal bacteria known as necrotizing fasciitis.
A woman in Florida died last month after contracting the bacteria when she fell into the water and cut her leg — a wound that measured just three-quarters of an inch, NBC reported. That afternoon she experienced overwhelming pain in her leg. Within days her limb was black and she was put on hospice care, eventually succumbing. She was diagnosed with necrotizing fasciitis and subsequently suffered from two strokes, kidney failure and sepsis.
At another Florida beach, a 12-year-old girl similarly complained of pain that started in her leg and traveled through her entire body, wrote her mother in a Facebook post. After an initial visit at a local hospital, doctors told the woman to send her daughter to a hospital in Indianapolis specializing in children's health where she was admitted to the ICU for an infection behind her knee and septic shock, reports Today. Though her recovery is expected to be a long one, a rush to emergency surgery saved the girl's life and prevented the amputation of her leg.
"We are not completely better, but we are on the road to recovery. We will have numerous doctors' visits, physical therapy and blood work to continue, but all that matters is my girl is ALIVE. I wanted to share her story in hopes that it may help save someone else. It is CRITICAL to be aware of the signs and symptoms and getting treatment quickly," she wrote.
Cases in 2019 are adding up at a rate much higher than in previous years: A young boy contracted vibrio in Maryland last week after swimming at a local beach, reports CBS. The Miami Herald reports the story of a man in Florida who contracted the flesh-eating bacteria and whose quick action similarly saved him from losing muscle tissue in the arm. Surprisingly, the man insisted that he became infected without being in the water.
Necrotizing fasciitis can be caused by a number of different bacteria, but is commonly caused by V. vulnificus when people wade into contaminated water with a cut or wound or eat raw shellfish infected by the bacteria. Endemic along the Southeast U.S. coast, the bacteria doesn't typically extend north of Virginia's Chesapeake Bay. However, a study published in the Annals of Internal Medicine suggests that as temperatures rise and make previously cooler regions more hospitable to the warm-water bacteria, infections will also increase in non-endemic areas
The researchers reported five occurrences of necrotizing fasciitis caused by V. Vulnificus in New Jersey during the summers of 2017 and 2018. By contrast, just one case had been diagnosed in the previous eight years, researchers told Medscape Medical News.
The quick-spreading infection starts with a red or swollen area of skin, severe pain and a fever, says the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Later symptoms can include ulcers, blisters, or black spots on the skin, changes in its coloration, pus or oozing from the infected area, as well as dizziness, fatigue, and diarrhea or nausea. Treatment requires hospital and intravenous antibiotics and surgery to reduce the rapid spread by removing the dead tissue to avoid sepsis, shock, and organ failure, as well as life-long complications for loss of limbs and severe scarring.
You probably already knew that #climatechange is affecting people's health. This study is just more proof: https://t.co/Q7n9pPt446 pic.twitter.com/Hw0bQpCBIb
— Greenpeace USA (@greenpeaceusa) March 19, 2018
Correction: A previous version of this article stated that three people were infected by a flesh eating bacteria. Two were infected, while a third was infected with vibrio vulnificus. The headline and story have been updated for clarity.
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By Marlene Cimons
Catherine Puckett needs to be close to the ocean. "I just can't be away from it," she said. "It means everything to me." She has to see it and smell it and hear the bells that ring from buoys offshore when a heavy sea rolls in from the east. When she is waist-deep in water, ankle-deep in mud, salt marsh on one side and water on the other, there's only one way she can describe it. "It's magical," she said. She even wades in during the coldest days of winter, often breaking through ice to get there. "I think to myself: 'why doesn't everybody do this?'" she said.
Americans only just survived the great romaine lettuce scare of 2018, and now the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has postponed routine domestic food safety inspections due to the partial federal government shutdown, the agency's commissioner said on Wednesday.
FDA commissioner Scott Gottlieb tweeted that the agency usually conducts about 160 domestic inspections on manufacturing and food processing plants each week. About a third of that inventory are foods considered at high risk for causing foodborne illnesses, such as seafood, dairy products, fruits and vegetables. The ongoing government impasse, however, has postponed much of these inspections.
Anyone planning to serve shrimp with their champagne this New Year's Eve should check their receipts.