PORTLAND – Four people were hospitalized with paralytic shellfish poisoning after eating contaminated mussels, officials said Wednesday. The incident marked the first case since at least 1980 in Maine.

Lobsterman Randy Beal and wife Brenda from Harrington were in critical condition Wednesday evening at Eastern Maine Medical Center in Bangor, a nursing supervisor said.

The source of the mussels was not a mussel bed, but rather from a 55-gallon plastic barrel that was found floating off the coast by Randy Beal. The lobsterman scraped mussels off the side of the barrel and took them home for a meal.

“Within minutes, they started having symptoms,” said Dr. Dora Mills, head of the Maine Center for Disease Control.

After the family took ill, samples of the mussels were taken from the home, tested and found to be contaminated with a marine biotoxin, commonly called “red tide,” associated with algae blooms in ocean waters that can cause paralytic shellfish poisoning.

Mussels and clams eat and filter the algae, and the toxins can cause serious illness or death if eaten by humans. The toxin levels in the tainted samples were 200 times higher than the threshold allowed for shellfish harvesting, Mills said.

Symptoms of PSP include tingling of the face and neck areas, headaches, nausea and muscle weakness. In extreme cases, the symptoms can lead to respiratory failure and death.

The Beals and a third family member who was in fair condition were hospitalized at Eastern Maine Medical after the incident. The fourth victim was at Down East Medical Center in Machias, but the condition was unavailable.

The Maine Department of Marine Resources monitors shellfish beds and closes areas to shellfish harvesting if levels of red tide are too high.

Health and marine officials were working together to determine the source of the contaminated mussels and to assure the public that any harvested shellfish is safe to eat.

George Lapointe, commissioner of the Department of Marine Resources, said the mussels may have become contaminated if the barrel floated through waters that had high concentrations of red tide.

But there is no need for the public to be alarmed, Mills said.

“I think what this whole thing points out is that when you buy shellfish, buy it from a certified dealer,” she said. “If you buy from a certified dealer, then that’s part of the monitoring program.”

The last case of paralytic shellfish poisoning in New England occurred in Massachusetts in 1991, when a fisherman ate tainted mussels that he pulled up in his nets while fishing in an area that was closed to shellfish harvesting, Mills said.

Copy the Story Link