Saxitoxin On a near-weekly basis for the last year, there’s been news of contamination to our surface waters, groundwater, and water bodies.
On the East End, Lake Agawam in Southampton displayed the most consistent HAB contamination, all through last spring and summer.
Other potential health effects can include diseases of the skin, eyes, ears, and respiratory tract.
Eating fish or shellfish harvested from waters with fecal contamination can also result in human illness, the EPA advises.
“Because crabs and lobster share a similar morphology and evolutionary past, methoprene interferes with their maturation as well.” County health officials justify its use as a strategy for reducing populations of mosquitos that might carry the West Nile virus.
Three people in the study died and autopsies revealed manganese levels two to three times the levels found in unexposed individuals.
In some cases, these same manganese exposure levels have been suspected of causing severe symptoms of manganism disease (including difficulty with speech and walking).
We do not know whether children are more sensitive than adults to the effects of manganese, but there is some indication from experiments in laboratory animals that they may be,” the CDC noted.
Ingestion of saxitoxin, usually by consumption of shellfish contaminated by toxic algal blooms, is responsible for the human illness known as paralytic shellfish poisoning.
Although there have been cases of PSP occurring in the absence of algal blooms, it’s widely believed blooms of infected algae — aka Gonyaulacoid dinoflagellates — contaminate the shellfish that eat it.