Anthropogenic Poison
Brookline, MA
2016, Senior, Creative Writing
The term “Arctic Circle” is a skewed one in many Western minds. Those two words might bring up an image of a Santa Clause being pulled by reindeer, a Christmas filled with presents and toy factories. Perhaps a memory of a polar bear lying on its back on the endless sheet of pure white ice pops up. The occasional person might think of cartoon igloos and Inuits clothed in seal fur. No matter the commercialized image one thinks of, the bottom line is that the truth is impossible for us to see. We do not see that the industrialized world we live in is putting an entire population of humans at risk. Through bio-magnification and bio-accumulation in aquatic and marine food chains, the toxins released from the burning of fossil fuels and mass cultivation of the agriculture industry are poisoning the people of the Arctic Circle, a people whose inability to afford the high-import taxes on food has left them with no option but to live off the increasingly dangerous land.
It’s a normal day in the Arctic Circle. I live in the heart of the Faroe Islands, a couple of hours from the capital Torshavn. I am a 13 year-old boy in my first year of high school. I have just arrived home from a long day at school and need to help my mother with some chores around the house before I can start my schoolwork. My mother usually needs help preparing food for dinner. Sometimes we go to the supermarket and purchase all kinds of food imported from Britain. But my father is a fisherman, and likes for us to live off the land. He often brings us home fresh fish from the sea, but sometimes when he is away on a fishing expedition, my mother and I set off to the market before preparing dinner. On the Faroe Islands, there is fresh fish being sold all year round because we are surrounded by the great ocean. There is also opportunity to purchase whale meat and whale blubber, and also seal and walrus meat. It is a long standing tradition in the Faroe Islands to eat this kind of food. I know many places in the world do not eat this. But for us, imported food is too expensive. I am lucky my father is a fisherman, but many of my people do not have jobs and live off the land. Eating whale has saved many of our people from starvation. It is a tradition in our culture.
Mercury poisoning is a widely known phenomenon in the twenty-first century. Mercury poisoning has its place in Alice in Wonderland with the role of the Mad Hatter, and pregnant women know to be careful with their amount of fish consumption. Many of us are certainly aware of the dangers associated with mercury and know that some kinds of fish (specifically tuna) contain high levels of it. But where is the mercury coming from and why are there such high levels of it in some species of fish? Mercury is a natural trace element. Around 230 metric tons of mercury are naturally released by the weathering process annually. The amount of naturally occurring elemental mercury is not harmful to humans. The presence of mercury poisoning is due to the anthropogenic release. Mercury is released in comparatively higher rates through the process of burning fossil fuels. We live in a coal-fueled world. Coal provides 41% of the world’s electricity and is the fastest growing primary energy source. Burning coal releases 3,000 tons of mercury every year. Alongside the astounding quantity of mercury entering the marine system every year is a various collection of other pollutants. These pollutants include oil as the result of oil spills, runoff from cities and industries, nutrients from the agriculture industry that cause eutrophication and a subsequent hypoxic environment, and hazardous plastics and chemicals (WWF).
“Out of sight, out of mind” is a common mindset in developed nations. People living in developed nations produce endless piles of garbage but are unaware of the real trace they are leaving. Garbage causes a matter of problems no matter how it is disposed of. Mercury is not the only problematic pollutant in the water. The disposal of garbage releases persistent organic pollutants (POPs), as well as organochlorine pesticides. Incineration, overflowing landfills, and garbage dumping are three frequent disposal methods that each leave a large and negative impact on the environment. Unfortunately, the moment we cannot see the garbage anymore does not mean it automatically disappears. In fact, the countless items we use and dispose of every day stick around a lot longer than we think.
In school, we learned of a study that had been conducted. It appeared in an issue of National Geographic, which is my favorite magazine. The study concluded that Inuit children who had been exposed to mercury in the womb were four times more likely to have lower IQ than the children with no mercury exposure. The children with the high mercury exposure scored an average of five points less on IQ tests. The study suggested that the children’s exposure to mercury and polychlorinated biphenyls from marine foods could lead to other negative health effects such as attention disorders and respiratory infections. This study scared my friends and me. We asked our teacher why the mercury levels in our food were so high, and she said she would give us a lesson on it tomorrow.
Biomagnification is the transfer of chemicals and substances from food to an organism, which results in a higher concentration in the latter. The lipid-soluble chemicals bio-accumulate within an organism’s fat tissues and are transferred to organisms on a higher trophic level. The anthropogenic pollutants are taken into marine food chains when the smallest marine organisms absorb them. The pollutants and chemicals then flow through the food chain, increasing in concentration with every level. The biomass is ingested by heterotrophs at succeeding trophic levels (Townsend 2012). Organisms residing at high levels on the food chain contain levels of methyl-mercury, persistent organic chemicals and PCBs that are dangerous for human consumption. Bio-accumulation is the increase in concentration of chemicals and substances (Gray 2002). The two processes, bio-magnifications and bio-accumulation, occur simultaneously and revere marine organisms with an incredibly high level of toxins. Methyl-mercury, classified as a persistent bio-accumulative toxin, remains in the environment.
Pilot whales, being top consumers in aquatic food chains, contain high levels of methyl-mercury, as well as PCBs. In the Faroe Islands, there is a long-standing tradition called grindadrap, or the grind. During the grind, locals use small boats to drive a type of whales called pilot whales, or Globicephala melas, into the shallow part of the bay where they are then killed with knives. Locals in the Faroe Islands then enjoy what to them is considered a delicacy.
Grindadrap has been in our culture for a very long time. It is a fun time, filled with visits from family, meeting up with friends, and eating lots of good food. Whale meat tastes delicious. The dish I help my mother prepare is known in Faroe as grindabuffer. It is a grilled whale steak.
Unfortunately, many people living on the Faroe Islands are unaware of the dangers that come with the tradition. Pilot whales have higher levels of mercury than most other marine animals. Muscle tissue from pilot whales contains an average concentration of 3.3 μg/g of mercury, of which half is methyl-mercury. Subsequent to the grind event, the average daily intake of mercury is 0.3 mg higher than the amount recommended by the World Health Organization. Methyl-mercury in humans acts as a neurotoxin. It impairs development in children, affecting IQ and motor skills. Methyl-mercury affects adults as well. Studies conducted have shown serious cardiovascular impairment to the exposure to high levels of mercury.
Eating whale meat and other sea animals is a part of our tradition and it is one of the only available sources of protein for us people here in the Faroe Islands. We do not eat a lot of whales here anymore, because people all around the world want to protect the whales. We love whales and want to protect them, too, but it is hard for us to get food with the right nutrients here. Imported food is expensive, and many of my people are impoverished. Most of the seafood we eat daily contains high levels of
mercury. I know if the entire world switched to clean energy sources such as wind and solar-powered energy, we could stop burning such a large amount of coal, slowing the infiltration of mercury into the marine food webs and inevitably poisoning me, my family, and my friends. It is up to the people in the industrial countries to conserve energy and be mindful about the effects they are having.
Reflection
After hearing that the topic of the essay was on ocean pollution, I knew exactly what I wanted to do. Recently I have been researching both environmental racism and environmental classism. The two subjects are both extremely important and relevant in today’s society, in both developing and developed countries, yet neither one is a well-known or openly discussed conversation. I think there’s a very interesting conversation of guilt that privileged people feel during these discussions, and it makes many people uncomfortable. This is exactly why we need to continue talking and writing about them and make sure everyone knows that the disposable society we live in has a very severe effect on underserved, struggling communities. The Arctic Circle is a specific area that I take a large interest in. These communities have been surviving off of the land for centuries, and their entire environment right now is at risk. The food they eat, the water they drink, the land they have built on – all of this is at the mercy of global warming, which is the direct result of the mass use of fossil fuels to fuel industrialization. People tend to be somewhat indifferent about the idea of climate change in general. Most people are upset about it but do little to take action. I think it would be different if people knew that global warming and climate change doesn’t only affect animal populations, biodiversity and weather patterns, but is also slowly and silently killing a population of humans. This is a message that needs to be widespread and well-known.