Abstract
Harmful algal blooms pose a challenge regarding food safety due to their erratic nature and forming circumstances which are yet to be disclosed. The best strategy to protect human consumers is through legislation and monitoring strategies. Global warming and anthropological intervention aided the migration and establishment of emerging toxin producers into Europe’s temperate waters, creating a new threat to human public health. The lack of information, standards, and reference materials delay effective solutions, being a matter of urgent resolution. In this work, the recent findings of the presence of emerging azaspiracids, spirolildes, pinnatoxins, gymnodimines, palitoxins, ciguatoxins, brevetoxins, and tetrodotoxins on European Coasts are addressed. The information concerning emerging toxins such as new matrices, locations, and toxicity assays is paramount to set the risk assessment guidelines, regulatory levels, and analytical methodology that would protect the consumers.
Highlights
Marine biotoxins are natural toxic metabolites usually produced during harmful algal blooms (HABs) that accumulate in marine organisms and migrate along the food chain [1].A HAB is characterized by a rapid proliferation of phytoplankton, the so-called red tides.As yet, their forming circumstances have not been disclosed, the rise of water temperature and anthropological intervention are pointed to as main triggers [2]
Vigilance and monitoring of coastal waters and marine species is of great importance
The novel emerging harmful algal species with serious public health impacts must be identified before any negative implications on shellfish consumers arise
Summary
Marine biotoxins are natural toxic metabolites usually produced during harmful algal blooms (HABs) that accumulate in marine organisms and migrate along the food chain [1]. The main entrance route to humans of these toxic substances is through consumption of contaminated seafood and a high number of intoxications occur every year [5,6] The occurrence of these marine biotoxins can cause massive economic losses to the fishery and aquaculture industry due to the cautionary closure of fishing and cultivation areas [7]. European legislation and monitoring protocols to detect and characterize them and fix their maximum levels in seafood [8,9] This has not occurred for all known marine toxins, and some groups still need to be regulated. For these toxins, maximum levels in shellfish were determined for human consumption using technology recognized as the state-of-the-art reference for the detection of these marine toxins using chemical methods [16].
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