A series of new reports take issue with the government’s positive assessment of the massive BP oil spill and its effects on marine life.
In late July, the Food and Drug Administration reopened fishing grounds for shrimp, after determining that they were “safe for consumption.” Then, federal officials announced that nearly 75 percent of the oil was gone, dissolved or dispersed. ProPublica assembled this round-up of new findings:
- 79 percent of the oil released into the Gulf “has not been recovered and remains a threat to the ecosystem,” researchers at the University of Georgia said. “The news media’s tendency to interpret ‘dispersed’ and ‘dissolved’ as ‘gone’ is wrong,” they said. “Dispersed and dissolved forms can be highly toxic.”
- Scientists at the University of Florida took an ultraviolet to the ocean floor, and found what appeared to be oil-containing sediment. They also said that bacteria and phytoplankton, which form the basis of the Gulf’s food chain, had been negatively affected.
- Two physicians affiliated with the Natural Resources Defense Council this week noted in the Journal of the American Medical Association that while vertebrate marine organisms can clear their systems of hydrocarbons, the chemicals can build up for years in invertebrates like shrimp, crabs and oysters. In the long run, they said, toxic metals from the oil can also concentrate in big fish as they eat more small fish that are contaminated, posing a threat to consumers.
