PHOENIX (AP) — Arizona's public-health laboratory will be a key player in the federal government's effort to find out whether oil is contaminating seafood in the Gulf of Mexico.
The Arizona Department of Health Services lab is among four state facilities nationally that will team with four federal labs to measure the impact of the massive British Petroleum oil leak on the region's seafood. The federal Food and Drug Administration says the testing is important to consumers and the fishing industry.
The labs will be testing for contaminants from oil continuing to spill from the blowout of the Deepwater Horizon offshore-drilling rig.
Arizona's lab gets new instruments for the testing to go with the ones it already has and is calibrating them now. Testing may begin in July.
"The full goal is to help the FDA nationally answer the question, 'Is seafood contaminated from the Gulf and, if so, is it a health hazard?'" DHS Director Will Humble said.
Some fishing areas in the region already have been closed, said Michael Taylor, the USDA's deputy commissioner for foods, on Tuesday in testimony prepared for a U.S. Senate panel. He said Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi have closed some coastal areas to recreational and commercial fishing, and Florida and Texas are monitoring their coastal waters.
Arizona's lab is part of the Food Emergency Response Network, or FERN, which pools resources of local, state and federal food-testing labs.
Jason Mihalic, Arizona's FERN supervisor, said it's mainly a volunteer network without any financial incentives.
But he said Arizona is one of 14 FDA grantees that study food contamination and help with surveillance of events like the oil disaster and other activities. He said the FDA provides money, instruments and other resources to those labs.
Arizona's lab joins with the California Animal Health and Food Safety Laboratory, Florida Department of Agriculture, the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture and the four federal labs in the fish testing.
The DHS lab expects to test as many as 300 samples a week of various kinds of seafood. Results will be evaluated by the FDA.
Arizona quickly volunteered when officials heard the federal government was looking for labs to help with the tests. Besides producing data that will help the FDA monitor the fish, the state's lab gets some new gear that increases its chemicals-testing capabilities.
Humble said all of Arizona's work will be funded by its FERN agreement.
"It's nice to be involved," FERN's Mihalic said. "We don't sit on an ocean, but to be involved in seafood surveillance for the entire nation is quite an honor."
