Vibriosis Closes Samish Bay to Commercial Oyster Harvesting - Again

Illness caused by oysters harvested from Samish Bay has once again closed the area to the commercial harvesting of oysters. As the Department of Health noted last week, the warm weather forecast for the coming weeks will likely increase the risk of contracting vibriosis from undercooked or raw oysters. Global climate change will most likely push that risk into the coming years.

This year it was noted by a high ranking Department of Health official that the 2006 peak of vibriosis contracted from oysters harvested in Washington state is now looking like a turning point in how global climate change (warming temperatures) is impacting whether shellfish harvested from Puget Sound are healthy to eat. When Bill Dewey with Taylor Shellfish was asked how controlling Vibrio vulnificus (a separate species of Vibrio found in the warmer waters of the Gulf States) was going, he answered, "It's not going real well." [read Food Safety article here] It would appear the same answer would apply to how controlling the spread of Vp through Washington's oysters is going.

As Governor Gregoire and agencies are pressured to allow corporate shellfish farming to expand in Puget Sound's tidelands and waters, they might consider first prioritizing the control of a known and most likely growing risk to consumers of shellfish: the naturally occurring bacteria named Vibrio parahaemolyticus and, if temperatures cause Puget Sound waters to warm, its more deadly cousin, Vibrio vulnificus. As those who contract vibriosis would most likely agree, at this point, "It's not going real well."