Last Friday, February 7, in a joint action by the Fisheries Inspection Service of the General Directorate of Fisheries of the Government of the Canary Islands and the Nature Protection Service (SEPRONA) of the Civil Guard, a 25-kilogram grouper was seized that lacked the corresponding documentation to prove its legal origin, and it was also a specimen that had not undergone the corresponding prior control of the ciguatera before its commercialization.
The specimen was obtained after an inspection of a restaurant establishment in San Sebastián de la Gomera. The agents proceeded to draw up a report for the infractions committed and confiscate the specimen, removing it from sale and subsequently depositing it in the Valle Gran Rey Fishermen's Guild, where the ciguatera test protocol was carried out, while awaiting the results. With this action, a serious danger to public health has been avoided.
Remember that in 2013, 14 people were poisoned in Lanzarote due to the ingestion of a grouper that had not passed previous controls for the absence of ciguatoxin. For said intoxication, the owner of the fish shop and an employee were sentenced respectively for a crime against public health, to three and a half years and two years and nine months in prison. Those affected had to be treated urgently, suffering diarrhea, cramps, toothache, itching, among other symptoms, and some of them even needing medical treatment for three months and most of them having sequelae in the form of paresthesias.
The General Directorate of Fisheries reminds us that all Fisheries products that are marketed must go through the First Sale points, which are the only ones that guarantee the appropriate health controls, which include a mandatory control for certain species of the absence of ciguatoxin before marketing, such as the case of grouper. We also encourage customers to ask restaurants for the first sale label of the products they are going to consume.
