U.S. declares Gulf seafood safe to eat

WASHINGTON, Oct. 30 (UPI) -- Six months after the oil well blowout, Gulf of Mexico seafood is safe to eat, two federal agencies say.

Officials from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration stated Friday that fewer than 1 percent of 1,735 seafood tissue samples tested were positive for traces of dispersants used to break up the oil, the Los Angeles Times reported.

Those samples that did test positive contained levels well below the safety threshold of 100 parts per million for fish and 500 parts per million for shrimp, crabs and oysters, federal officials said.

"This new test should help strengthen consumer confidence in gulf seafood," FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg said. "The overwhelming majority of the seafood tested shows no detectable residue, and not one of the samples shows a residue level that would be harmful for humans."

The samples, collected from June to September, were drawn from a range of fish species -- including tuna, wahoo, swordfish, gray snapper and butterfish -- and shellfish, including shrimp, crabs and oysters. They were tested for dioctyl sodium sulfosuccinate, a compound in the dispersant.

Nearly 9,444 square miles in the gulf is still closed to commercial and recreational fishing.