No Eyes And Tumors: Contaminated Shrimp May Make You Sick or Even Kill You not safe for work language pictures and video–watch t hese vidos and forward

Most people like to have family get-togethers during the holiday season. Shrimp cocktails are very popular, but although they make great finger food for those holiday parties, you might reconsider taking a bite if you knew how dangerous they can be.

By the numbers, shrimp is easily America’s #1 seafood and a whopping 85% of the shrimp we eat is imported. The largest exporters of shrimp are third-world countries like Thailand and Vietnam.

 In countries such as these, shrimp are often farmed in ponds treated with a long list of chemicals: urea, superphosphate, diesel, pesticides, antibiotics (including ones banned in the U.S.), sodium tripolyphosphate (a suspected neurotoxin), borax and occasionally caustic soda. The ponds are made near the ocean, relying on the tide to refresh the water and carry shrimp excrement out to sea. Due to chemicals used to treat the ponds, the area nearby quickly turns into a dead zone for other types of animal life.

Due to these farming conditions, shrimp exports from these countries have been found to contain pesticides, antibiotics and dangerous chemicals. The scary part is that the FDA inspects fewer than 2% of all seafood imports. Those that are rejected often contain Salmonella, banned drugs and filth.

Diseases have impacted the shrimp industry. Thailand is the world’s largest supplier of shrimp and it is battling an epidemic that could cost the industry $1.54 billion in lost exports. Early Mortality Syndrome, caused by orally transmitted bacteria that shut down a shrimp’s digestive system, is on track to wipe out 40% of the country’s annual output.

With this drop in supply it might make you wonder how much importers are willing to cut corners in food safety to protect their profits now that the cost of shrimp has risen so drastically. The focus of corporations, and sometimes even of government inspectors, is more on the impact to corporate America than how safe it is for you to eat.

In his book Dangerous Business, economist Pat Choate spoke on the dangers of food imports from China. “Although investigators reported that China’s food supply does not meet either international or U.S. standards, they also advised Congress not to impose equivalent safety measures on food imported from China, as the Department of Agriculture does with meat, because China would not meet those standards, which would close off Chinese food exports to America. Commerce trumped safety.“

Something needs to change in the way we address food imports into the U.S. We need to levy import fees or tariffs on seafood imports for more inspectors, and we need the autonomy to make decisions for ourselves, rather than allow ourselves to be hampered by WTO rulings and regulations. The WTO has no business telling Americans what we are permitted to do to secure our own health and safety! We cannot continue to risk the safety of our food supply or the health of our consumers so multinational corporations can reap record profits.

This must be done immediately to prevent further unnecessary deaths due to unchecked and contaminated imported food! SOURCE: ECONOMY IN CRISIS