According to the latest report by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Americans increased their seafood consumption by nearly 1 pound per person in 2015, to an average of 15.5 pounds per year, or just over 4.75 ounces per week.

That’s the largest increase in seafood consumption in two decades. While this is good news, we still fall short of dietary recommendations, which call for 8 ounces of seafood per week.

Shrimp, salmon and tuna top the most-consumed list of seafood. Unfortunately, both shrimp and tuna have serious drawbacks.

On the upside, salmon, as long as it’s wild caught in Alaska is a great choice, and one-third of the increase was in fact attributed to people buying more canned Alaskan salmon. As reported by NPR:

“That increase may stem from The Emergency Food Assistance Program at the USDA, which purchased more than $40 million in surplus canned Alaskan salmon in 2014 and 2015 and distributed it to food banks across the country.”

Eat More Seafood, but Be Mindful of Your Choices

As noted by NPR, warnings about sustainability and toxicity led many Americans to shy away from seafood over the past couple of decades. Indeed, it can be tricky to gain clarity about what’s healthy and what’s not. There are plenty of pitfalls and hazards these days.

Cold-water fatty fish is a great source of vitally important fats — both saturated and omega-3s — but the benefits of eating fish can easily be negated by selecting varieties that tend to be highly contaminated with mercury. Surprisingly, farmed fish have been shown to be even more toxic than wild fish.

There’s also the issue of food fraud. So how do you make sense of it all? I’ll do my best to break it down for you in this article.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ics1AaOuN74