JAMA 2006; 296: 1885-1899

Refers to fish consumption rather than fish oil consumption, but thought it may be of some interest.

so far as i know, some such clays and things will absorb some amount of some nasties but i am not sure it is a complete panacea, especially as it might also cleanse the product of the good things too!

www.equazen.com/gfx/ul/files/process.pdf

essentially, they seem to remove the protein (where the naughty mercury lives) and remove the “bad” fats from the oils but i’m not sure what they do that removes all of the lipid soluble badness

they also give their source fish and oceans: sardines, pilchards and tuna from the south pacific and atlantic

Equazen also have this line about “using fish from the world’s least polluted oceans” -though not sure which ones those would be these days. I can believe coastal fish from (e.g.) polluted estuaries would have more toxins/pollutants than ocean fish.

Which reminds one that the people eating the MOST polluted fish are likely to be the 3rd world poor living near industrial zones, who presumably rely disproportionately on local coastal fish pulled from heavily polluted waters. Double whammy.

As was mentioned about, the FishOilersall mention “molecular distillation” to remove organic impurities like PCBs – for another example see

www.authentic-breathing.com/omegarx.pdf

My n yrs back Chemistry degree didn’t mention “molecular distillation”, although I remember plain old “distillation” well enough. I don’t know how well this removes lipophilic PCBs, aryl hydrocarbons, pesticide residues etc. etc. but maybe someone else hereabouts does.

Of course, it’s rather a pity we can’t NOT pollute waters with all this shite in the first place. On that at least I’m with the Greenies.

btw i tend to use cartoonish descriptions of things, including to patients, such as “nasties” rather than PCBs, dioxins, pesticides… but i can speak “science” when i have to

As I said above somewhere, I think they do have some tricks for removing “chemical nasties” like PCBs.

Apart from anything else, before they were telling you the stuff would make you dead brainy, a lot of the “Fish(Oil)Pitch” – esp. in the US – was that the Fish oils would give you “the goodies of fish without the EVIL Hg / PCBs”

Although it would take more than that to make me trade my pan-fried salmon steak for a fistful of fish-pills.

I do wonder how much of their “clean-up” is basically just NOT using the tissues where nasties are most concentrated, which would be guts (esp liver), gills and skin, applying some fairly basic toxicology.

But once you have a “liquid product” there will always be SOME nifty chemical way of cleaning it up. Just depends how much you are prepared to spend doing it

In answer to Ben’s post (#26) I trawled Web of Science for any reference to M* Portwood (search term to find all authors surname Portwood who have an initial M). There were 26 hits. All of them, as far as i could determine, were for MM Portwood who specialises in something completely different. The only published work for Madeliene Portwood I could find were the books she has published on dealing with dyspraxia.

“We use a highly sophisticated six-stage process to ensure that the oil used in the finished product is the highest quality and free from contaminants. This process starts from the careful sourcing of fish (sardines, pilchards and tuna) from local fisherman fishing in the world’s cleanest seas.

The oils are then washed, chilled and filtered so that contaminants are removed — well in excess of FSA requirements — whilst maintaining the integrity of the oil itself.”

It was on this site:
www.naturalproductsonline.co.uk/industry_news.asp?ItemID=2113&rcid=71&pcid=65&cid=71

So it appears that Equazen’s oils are full of natural goodness without the nasty man-made pollutants.

back on the point, Dr Aust’s link to oceans alive says that the mercury binds to protein and the oil should be fat/lipid so i suppose it should be ok… unless some nasties are lipid soluble (as many things are in pharmacology) such as dioxins, PCBs and pesticides (same source) and so will be in highest concentrations in the oil/lipid/fat of the fish

still sure they are safe?

Mmmmmmmmmmmm

I used to eat polyunsaturate-rich marge myself, but have defaulted back to butter since ‘Er Indoors (the medical half of the family but born and raised on a dairy farm) flaty refuses to touch “plastic marge”.

Like many other diet / “lifestyle” interventions, it isa question of degree. All in all I suspect that:

(i) not smoking;
(ii) staying physically active;
(iii) not being a huge fat bloater and
(iv) not chowing through shedloads of high saturated fat high-salt processed shite

…are so dominant in the “cardiovascular disease risk” sweepstakes that butter vs. marge on your morning toast is unlikely to be a biggie, except insofar as it relates to (iii).

Equazen have started putting leaflets in Holland and Barrett – a location they clearly thought of as impervious to scientists owing to the prevalence of Gilliam McKeithenalia – talking about Durham’s “…randomised, double-blind, placebo controlled trial”. It takes some careful reading (through a red haze of anger) before one realises that they’re not talking about the very large upcoming trial but the smaller trial partially detailed on www.durhamtrial.org.

The intention is clearly to mislead fools such as myself. I bought fifteen crates of fish oil before I realised my error. Death to Equazen!

Butter vs Marg fear goes further than simple transfats, some will scream ‘it’s plastic I tell you, plastic!!‘

See spreading the fear (and links therein) for details.

ps thanks!

Equazen make a big song and dance about the “processing” of their oils – see the animated bit at:

www.equazen.com/default.aspx?pid=143

- or the PDF version at :

www.equazen.com/gfx/ul/files/process.pdf

..indeed, a significant bit of Equazen’s web “pitch” is based on saying:

(i) Our oils are more “scientifically” formulated and carefully produced than other suppliers; and

(ii) They are better supported by proper research

In the light of this thread and the previous ones the irony of part (ii) is rather cherishable….

On mercury/PCBs, I would expect there to be less in the oil than in actual fish as once it is in oil form they can (as jdc says) no doubt process it to remove things.

There is some info on contaminant nasty levels in food grade fish oils at:

www.oceansalive.org/eat.cfm?subnav=article&contentID=4362

..which amazingly actually indicates some “real” references.

BTW Dr Monkey, I suspect the margarine vs. butter debate (debacle?) you are referring to is about avoiding this year’s baddies, trans fats in margarine. But the history of the butter vs. marge thing is interesting in the context of the “nutrional advice for optimum health” debate, and nicely exemplifies why many of your punters probably despair of advice about What To Eat.

Back in the 80s, when cholesterol was the Big Baddie, and pre-statins, margarine was heavily promoted on “avoid butter – nasty bad cholesterol and saturated fats!” – margerine good! – unsaturated fats!”. This carried on into the 90s, and no self-respecting health freak in the 80s or early 90s would have eaten butter.

More recently, since DIETARY cholesterol has been somewhat down-graded as a source of body cholesterol (and the “debate” has moved on more to LDL/HDL) and since hydrogenated trans-fats have become Big Bad Nasties, butter has made a come-back since you can now say “Arrgh! Trans-fats! Margarine BAD!”

Result – people are totally confused. Enter “mystify-’em” nutritionists saying “Oh, what you need to do is read the FULL list of contents to ask EXACTLY how much saturated fat / trans fat / unsaturated fat / cholesterol…

…or alternatively buy the one that has my picture on it! Ker-ching!

No wonder many people just say “oh stuff it” and go back to eating the one whose taste they prefer.