The three big tuna companies - Bumble Bee, Starkist and Chicken of the Sea - have joined forces to peddle mercury laden tuna to mothers and children who are the most vulnerable to mercury exposure. Tuna the Wonderfish should really be Tuna the Toxic Fish. All tuna contains mercury; and even "light skipjack" tuna is mercury contaminated. The risk to a woman or child's health from mercury is directly related to how much tuna they eat and their weight. The tuna industry is selling them on eating lots and lots!
The tuna fantasy campaign features a woman clearly of child-bearing age surrounded by attractive, athletic young men in a dream kitchen reminiscent of the 1950s when women were supposedly content to stay home and please their men with food and sex. Another fantasy. Who wrote these ads anyway? Charlie the Tuna?
The tuna fantasy website is offering misleading and potentially harmful advice when it FAILS TO MENTION MERCURY AT ALL OR THE FDA ADVISORY WHICH TELLS WOMEN AND CHILDREN TO LIMIT CONSUMPTION OF MERCURY LADEN FISH INCLUDING ALBACORE TUNA.
The tuna fantasy campaign blatantly urges women to eat at least two servings of fish each week and recommends pregnant and breastfeeding women eat two to three meals each week, including high-mercury albacore tuna. Nowhere is mercury mentioned. So what happens if they follow this advice and they or their child becomes ill? Will Tuna the Wonderfish come to the rescue?
The tuna fantasy conflicts with ample and recent scientific tuna testing and advice from numerous sources that women and children SHOULD SEVERELY LIMIT OR NOT EAT CANNED TUNA. (Consumers Union, Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch, Good Housekeeping).
It seems that the tuna companies are so desperate to sell fish that they will put at risk both women and children to make profits. Gee that sounds familiar . . tobacco . . .alcohol . . . lead . . .
At best this ad campaign is irresponsible or a clear case of false and misleading advertising. At worst it could be making women and children sick. In case, the ad campaign is outrageous and wrong and should be removed.
Read more about mercury in tuna at www.gotmercury.org.
Posted in Blog
Comments Comments are now closed for this item. Comment by Liz McMaster, Feb 13th, 2011 8:21pm
Pacific Albacore is very low in mercury; negligible amounts in young fish. Buy Oregon troll-caught Albacore tuna and eat the safer, healthier fish.
We don't catch dolphins or turtles, only tuna!
liz.mcmaster@gmail.com
Comment by Intelligent, Jan 29th, 2011 12:22pm
No facts, and a lot of smarmy, feminist, misleading information. How do organizations like yours exist. Oh, that's right, most people are scientifically illiterate, like yourselves.
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