Potential Harmful Effects of Heavy Metals in Marine Food on Human Health: A Critical Review

Introduction: The survival of organisms is threatened with a variety of pollutants and chemical compounds and population growth. Natural phenomena and human activities, especially industrial activities increase contamination of water, soil, and air. Population growth leads to increased exploitation of the sea and oceans, thus the consumption of seafood increases. Besides, the main food of the people in some areas is fish. Consumption of fish has numerous benefits to human health, but the presence of some heavy metals including lead, cadmium, arsenic, and mercury may cause toxicity to marine organisms. Methods: For this review study, keywords such as “Heavy metals”, “Marine, Safety”, and “Toxicity” were used. The databases searched for in those articles were “Google Scholar”, “SID”, “Scapus”, “PubMed”, “Science Direct”, and “ISI” search engines. Results: The degree of heavy metal toxicity depends on their chemical form of metals. Some forms of metals are rapidly excreted and do not have the opportunity to be absorbed and stored in body tissues, accordingly they are not very toxic, while some forms of metals are highly toxic and lethal. These forms are slowly excreted from metals and can be absorbed and accumulated in fish muscles and other organs. Heavy metals cause harmful effects such as carcinogenesis, malformations, damage to the nervous system, damage to the reproductive system and infertility in men, liver failure and cardiovascular disease, and so on. Conclusion: Therefore, this review focused on the concentration of heavy metals in fish muscle is essential to ensure the safety of this type of food.

Keywords:

Heavy metals , Marine , Safety , Toxicity