Women who had swordfish for dinner last night shouldn t panic, stressed FDA food chief Joseph Levitt. The risk comes from mercury building up, not a single meal. They should just simply stop eating it from this time forward, Levitt said. We want to empower women to protect the health of their unborn child and the best way they can do that here is to avoid eating those four kinds of fish. But different types of fish can harbor different amounts of mercury.
Mercury enters the environment naturally and through industrial pollution.
Nearly all fish contain trace amounts of methylmercury but longer-lived, larger fish that feed on other fish, like shark or swordfish, accumulate the highest amounts of methylmercury and pose the largest threat to people who eat them regularly. Still, seafood, a naturally low-fat source of protein, can be an important part of a balanced diet for pregnant women and women who may become pregnant, FDA said. You can safely eat 12 ounces per week of cooked fish, the FDA advisory said. You can choose shellfish, canned fish, smaller ocean fish or farm-raised fish just pick a variety of different species. A National Academy of Sciences report issued last July estimated that up to 60,000 children a year were born who had been exposed to levels of mercury during pregnancy that could interfere with the development of the brain and nervous system.