The concentration of mercury is rising in many fish, such as in Colorado where 20 percent of rivers and lakes feature tainted fish.

In late February, the United Nations Environment Program Governing Council (UNEP) and environmental leaders from more than 140 nations met to commit to a plan to stop mercury pollution across the globe. 

Mercury, when ingested by humans, can lead to disrupted neurological development including language and attention skills. Typically ingestion of mercury happens by eating seafood. Marine life store mercury through the food chain after living in contaminated waters. 

In the closing days of the Bush Administration, the FDA issued a draft ruling stating that the benefits to pregnant women of eating fish outweighs the risk, which has one physician deeply concerned.

This is issue is so important in America that the Obama administration quickly overturned the Bush administration’s denial of the mercury plan by signing the UNEP treaty. Interestingly enough, allies like Australia and Canada also opposed the treaty initially prior to the US approval of the plan. 

Now that the treaty has been signed, UNEP is hosting educational workshops advising nations on how they can limit mercury emissions as well as publishing literature to the same effect. UNEP is forming partnerships and working to continue dialog across nations solving a human health issue with less focus as an environmental issue. Either way, reducing mercury in the environment results in a healthier environment for all. 

One of the most significant methods of reducing mercury is through shutting down coal-fired power plants that emit mercury into the atmosphere, which then disperses and is deposited into the environment via air currents and bioaccumulation in the food chain.

Additional targets for reduction are cement manufacturing, and metal and gold mining. Shutting down and controlling these industries goes beyond cleaning up mercury; it cleans up air quality and climate change contributions. Now that the international community is committed to this, maybe we can also commit to reducing air pollution, climate change and habitat destruction, although, probably one step at a time.