Thousands of tonnes of British shellfish currently eaten in Europe could be banned under new international safety limits for radioactivity in food, the UK Food Standards Agency (FSA) has warned.
Lobsters, cockles and scallops from the north west of England and the south west of Scotland are so contaminated with plutonium from the Sellafield nuclear complex in Cumbria that they will breach limits due to be introduced by the United Nations in 2005.
Although the new limits are welcomed by radiation experts, they are regarded as "not proportionate to the actual risk" by the FSA. And they have angered the multi-million pound shellfishing industry. Douglas Macleod, chairman of the Association of Scottish Shellfish Growers, said that limits should only be set on the basis of robust science backed by credible risk assessments. "Why should the industry be unnecessarily crucified if there is no real risk?" he asked.
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Concentrations of plutonium and related isotopes in all the shellfish sampled by the FSA between the Ribble estuary at Preston and Kirkcudbright on the North Solway coast in 2002 exceeded 1Bq/kg. Winkles from St Bees, next to Sellafield, contained 66 Bq/kg."
EDIT
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99996516