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Bivalve Shellfish Safety in Portugal: Variability of Faecal Levels, Metal Contaminants and Marine Biotoxins during the Last Decade (2011–2020)

Bivalves are a high-value product whose production has markedly increased, reaching 9863 tonnes in Portugal in 2021. Bivalves’ habitats—lagoons, estuaries and coastal waters—are exposed to biological and anthropogenic contaminants, which can bioaccumulate in these organisms and pose a significant pu...

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Autores principales: Braga, Ana Catarina, Rodrigues, Susana Margarida, Lourenço, Helena Maria, Costa, Pedro Reis, Pedro, Sónia
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9962144/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36828406
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/toxins15020091
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author Braga, Ana Catarina
Rodrigues, Susana Margarida
Lourenço, Helena Maria
Costa, Pedro Reis
Pedro, Sónia
author_facet Braga, Ana Catarina
Rodrigues, Susana Margarida
Lourenço, Helena Maria
Costa, Pedro Reis
Pedro, Sónia
author_sort Braga, Ana Catarina
collection PubMed
description Bivalves are a high-value product whose production has markedly increased, reaching 9863 tonnes in Portugal in 2021. Bivalves’ habitats—lagoons, estuaries and coastal waters—are exposed to biological and anthropogenic contaminants, which can bioaccumulate in these organisms and pose a significant public health risk. The need to obtain a safe product for human consumption led to the implementation of standardised hygiene regulations for harvesting and marketing bivalve molluscs, resulting in routine monitoring of bivalve production areas for microbial quality, metal contaminants, and marine biotoxins. While excessive levels of biotoxins and metal contamination lead to temporary harvesting bans, high faecal contamination leads to area reclassification and impose post-harvest treatments. In this study, the seasonal and temporal variability of these parameters were analysed using historical data generated by the monitoring programme during the last decade. Moreover, the impact of the monitoring program on bivalve harvesting from 2011 to 2020 was assessed. This program presented a considerable improvement over time, with an increase in the sampling effort and the overall program representativeness. Finally, contamination risk, revising control measures, and defining recommendations for risk mitigation measures are given in the light of ten years’ monitoring.
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spelling pubmed-99621442023-02-26 Bivalve Shellfish Safety in Portugal: Variability of Faecal Levels, Metal Contaminants and Marine Biotoxins during the Last Decade (2011–2020) Braga, Ana Catarina Rodrigues, Susana Margarida Lourenço, Helena Maria Costa, Pedro Reis Pedro, Sónia Toxins (Basel) Article Bivalves are a high-value product whose production has markedly increased, reaching 9863 tonnes in Portugal in 2021. Bivalves’ habitats—lagoons, estuaries and coastal waters—are exposed to biological and anthropogenic contaminants, which can bioaccumulate in these organisms and pose a significant public health risk. The need to obtain a safe product for human consumption led to the implementation of standardised hygiene regulations for harvesting and marketing bivalve molluscs, resulting in routine monitoring of bivalve production areas for microbial quality, metal contaminants, and marine biotoxins. While excessive levels of biotoxins and metal contamination lead to temporary harvesting bans, high faecal contamination leads to area reclassification and impose post-harvest treatments. In this study, the seasonal and temporal variability of these parameters were analysed using historical data generated by the monitoring programme during the last decade. Moreover, the impact of the monitoring program on bivalve harvesting from 2011 to 2020 was assessed. This program presented a considerable improvement over time, with an increase in the sampling effort and the overall program representativeness. Finally, contamination risk, revising control measures, and defining recommendations for risk mitigation measures are given in the light of ten years’ monitoring. MDPI 2023-01-18 /pmc/articles/PMC9962144/ /pubmed/36828406 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/toxins15020091 Text en © 2023 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Braga, Ana Catarina
Rodrigues, Susana Margarida
Lourenço, Helena Maria
Costa, Pedro Reis
Pedro, Sónia
Bivalve Shellfish Safety in Portugal: Variability of Faecal Levels, Metal Contaminants and Marine Biotoxins during the Last Decade (2011–2020)
title Bivalve Shellfish Safety in Portugal: Variability of Faecal Levels, Metal Contaminants and Marine Biotoxins during the Last Decade (2011–2020)
title_full Bivalve Shellfish Safety in Portugal: Variability of Faecal Levels, Metal Contaminants and Marine Biotoxins during the Last Decade (2011–2020)
title_fullStr Bivalve Shellfish Safety in Portugal: Variability of Faecal Levels, Metal Contaminants and Marine Biotoxins during the Last Decade (2011–2020)
title_full_unstemmed Bivalve Shellfish Safety in Portugal: Variability of Faecal Levels, Metal Contaminants and Marine Biotoxins during the Last Decade (2011–2020)
title_short Bivalve Shellfish Safety in Portugal: Variability of Faecal Levels, Metal Contaminants and Marine Biotoxins during the Last Decade (2011–2020)
title_sort bivalve shellfish safety in portugal: variability of faecal levels, metal contaminants and marine biotoxins during the last decade (2011–2020)
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9962144/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36828406
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/toxins15020091
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