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News media sound the alarm on mercury in seafood during pregnancy โ€” was it a false alarm?

April 28, 2016 โ€” A recent 20-page policy report from the Environmental Working Group included alarming news: According to a study they conducted, โ€œnearly three in 10 of the women had more mercury in their bodies than the EPA says is safe,โ€ and rates were highest among women who ate seafood frequently.

Based on this, they issued a news release with the alarming headline of โ€œU.S. Seafood Advice Could Expose Women And Babies To Too Much Mercury, Not Enough Healthy Fats.โ€

That sounds like importantโ€“and clickyโ€“news, and the media acted accordingly: At least a dozen different news outlets wrote about the study, including high-profile publications like The Washington Post (โ€œWhy itโ€™s still so hard to eat fish and avoid mercuryโ€), TIME Magazine (โ€œCanned Tuna Is Too High In Mercury for Pregnant Women: Health Groupโ€), and CNN. (โ€œStudy of mercury in fish brings call to strengthen government guidelinesโ€)

Seafood industry fires back hostile response that, well, partially made sense

The seafood industry trade group National Fisheries Institute caught wind of the report and resulting news coverage, and fired back big time, with a news release, โ€œMercury โ€˜Studyโ€™ Out of Step with Real Science.โ€  They didnโ€™t stop there, turning their ire specifically at TIME Magazine, asking โ€œSeriouslyโ€ฆ.what is wrong with TIME Magazine?โ€

While itโ€™s debatable whether this miffed tone helps or hurts the trade organizationโ€™s public relations effort, NFI does have a point: The news coverage, in general, could have been stronger.

Before we get into what journalists could have done differently, we do want to stress that EWGโ€™s study conclusionsโ€“that mercury contamination in fish is more widespread than government agencies acknowledgeโ€“very well may be true. Itโ€™s just their report doesnโ€™t prove this, certainly not on its own.

Read the full story at Health News Review

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