Eating Seafood May Obstruct Natural Human Defense System Mechanism, Here's Why

Environmental pollutants that are found in fish have shown to reduce the human body's defense system ability to get rid of harmful toxins. The UC San Diego-based Scripps Institution of Oceanography research team suggests that the information can be instrumental to better learn about eating contaminated seafood's health risks to humans.

Animals and plants' proteins called P-gp are what fulfill the roles of expelling all sorts of harmful foreign chemicals away from the system. P-gp, known for transporting therapeutic drugs for cancer patients, renders cells resistance to multiple drugs, according to a feature from Eureka Alert.

In order to identify the P-gp cells' efficiency in getting rid of contaminated cells from agricultural and industrial pollutants in seafood, which are collectively named persistent organic pollutants (POPs), the team conducted P-gp proteins biochemical analysis. Scientists set their focus on POPs that are commonly found in the urine and blood of humans. The pollutants were made of legacy compounds like DDT pesticide and flame retardants.

The researchers were able to discover that all 10 pollutants were active elements that interfered with P-gp's ability to protect cells. This study was the first to reveal how PBDE-100, an upholstery plastics and foam flame retardant, was able to bind to a transporter protein.

The POP attaches to a protein in the same way that a chemotherapeutic drug, but ultimately inhibits the transporter protein's ability to carry out its defense function.

The researchers also emphasized that fish larvae and newborns are the populations that are the most vulnerable. Newborns are susceptible since they have high POPs concentrations from breast milk. Fish larvae, on the other hand, may be more at risk since pollutant accumulation has the ability to slow down the defense system against other marine pollutants, like oil hydrocarbons from oil spill sites.

The Scripps researchers wrote that these environmental chemicals must be further tested to identify if they hamper the body's natural defense from expelling toxins and foreign chemicals. According to a feature from New Vision, the United States Food and Drug Administration at present recommend the same for pharmaceuticals.

The study was first published in Science Advances journal on April 15.