hye daisy,
greenpeace cyberactivist.

WHALES MEAT CONSUMPTION: ITS SIDE EFFECTS
by tomakint on 05 May 2004 @ 02:39 PM

I have always see myself as somebody living in a world where non-challant attitudes reign supreme, where indifference approaches to thorny issues are flagrantly displayed. Whales live in oceans and perhaps seas, but listen to this, “after the World War II, about 120,000 tons of toxic materials, mostly phosgene and mustard gas, was sealed in ships and sunk at sea, some to the northwest of Northern Ireland. Russian scientists even gave the warning recently that these materials are now in danger of leaking. Cyanide solutions are used in Southeast Asia to stun fish, though when washed from the fish’s system, it made them edible, yet the toxin remains in the sea water, killing coral reefs. Over the years a variety of wastes have been dumped into the oceans, seas and rivers in form of radio actives wastes.

Whales are ground feeders especially the Baleen whales and since these toxins undergo biological, physical or chemical change as they may be distributed throughout the ocean by its strong currents, obviously, it makes them prone to its bioaccumulation effects. The health risk is that such deadly substances could be passed up the food chain to the final consumers of whales – man. As we know that no forensic research is conducted on hunted whales, it would be difficult to detect how diseased a particular one may be. A number of infectious diseases can be transferred to man in the process, especially those that are foolhardy to eat it raw – the Eskimos.
Even cooked ones may not be too safe for consumption, there are many microbes that can survive higher temperatures and for whales’ meats that has lots of fats, the thermophiles within could survive the heating method used (be it roasting, frying or boiling). Remember that, radioactive wastes could kill gradually when passed up the food chain, believe it now that, the oceans is the largest reservoir of radioactive wastes on earth.

Already, whales consumers may be carrying about diseases associated with infected whales since their homes (oceans and seas) are being polluted on daily basis. It will be advisable if this habit can be discontinued for the strict survival of whales and basically for the sound health in humanity, I think it worth the sacrifice.