Bacterial infection ‘linked to dredging’

by John Mikkelsen

First published at the  

 

 EVIDENCE of a likely link between serious bacterial infections and contaminated dredge spoil in Gladstone Harbour has been presented to a Senate select committee by an environmental medicine specialist previously employed by a major resource company.

Dr Andrew Jeremijenko told the Environment and Communications Legislation Committee last week he knew of three cases of the rare shewenella bacteria infecting Gladstone fishermen. He said this was normally associated with heavy metals and it was “extremely rare” to find a cluster of three cases.

A patient of his had been on the verge of having a leg amputated  when the infection was finally diagnosed after 12 months. Before that, doctors had been unable to find the cause or effective treatment.

Gladstone patient left leg & foot


“This person was written off as an undiagnosed case—just a swollen leg. It took a year to find out what he had. A friend of his also had shewenella, so we have had a number of cases,” Dr Jeremijenko said.

He said he knew of another case in Gladstone he was not involved with, where the patient did lose a leg. “In that case it was a vibrio infection."

"The study by the (State) government is a fairly superficial one. In my view it did not follow up these patients for long enough,” Dr Jeremijenko said.

His Gladstone patient was a shark fisherman. “He chops off shark fins for a living, then he pushes the body of the shark away and wraps up the fins and sends them to Asia.
“The shark has had all that disease on it. The juice was falling on to his left leg, which is the leg that got infected….

The other case was a fisherman who got it from washing his boat out. He had to go down into the water to adjust the pump and got the infection there.”

Dr Jerimijenko said the bacteria was more often seen in ‘boat people’ refugees, where there were dead fish and ‘hot water’ at the bottom of the boats.

He told the committee the bacteria was also found in “a lot of the sick fish in Gladstone Harbour”.
“Shewenella is very interesting because it is associated with heavy metals.

In fact, if you have a site contaminated with heavy metals, an anaerobic environment, it can chew up the metal and clean up the site.

“I think that what has happened in this case is that the dredging has pulled up all these bacteria along with the metals that we see in the dredge spoil. It has made the shewenella bio-available and that has caused the infection in these people…. It is extremely rare to have a cluster of three cases…. you would need more cases than that to call it statistically significant—but it is certainly an aberration that needs to be investigated,” Dr Jeremijenko said.

The Senate committee has been gathering evidence from a number of scientists and other interested groups to report on the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Amendment (Great Barrier Reef) Bill 2013.

Dr Jeremijenko said he was previously employed as Chief Medical Officer for Woodside, a major resource company, and had worked closely with them for years on improving health in the Pilbara. The company he now runs, TeleDoctor, has for three years supported QGC and Origin Energy (which are involved in the multi-billion dollar coal seam gas and LNG industries in Central Queensland).

“We have done dredging in Woodside for many years to open that harbour, but we have not seen infections like this (at Gladstone).
“There are ways to do dredging safely. You can use things like silt curtains. You can use closed containment systems. You can now suck out the spoil from underneath the top area and that can protect you from having all the tides washing up the turbidity… but they cost more money.”

With Abbot Point (near Bowen), they said that they looked at onshore disposal, which is the preferred method for acid sulphate soils, and they found that it was too expensive; it was economically prohibitive,” Dr Jeremijkenko said.

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Serious health concerns over Gladstone oysters

By John Mikkelsen – Saturday 19th January, 2012

IGNORANCE is said to be bliss, but  medical and science experts have pointed out it could have serious consequences when it comes to contaminated seafood, including oysters.

Gladstone residents and tourists remain largely unaware of dangers from potentially contaminated oysters and shellfish following toxic algae blooms and the presence of heavy metals detected last year. However, in NSW authorities were quick to issue an official warning about contaminated Sydney oysters in the lead up to the Christmas holidays..

Toxic lyngbya majuscula algae was positively identified in Gladstone Harbour last year following the hospitalisation of two Turkey Beach fishers, and poisonous diatoms, another form of marine algae, were also detected, but no health warnings were issued.

The risks of consuming possibly contaminated local shellfish including oysters were recently highlighted by aquatic disease specialist Dr Matt Landos following extensive research in Gladstone waters.

Dr Landos told the Queensland Telegraph that shellfish populations exposed to the increased sediment load generated by dredging were likely to have been significantly impacted.

“The timing of mortality of oysters (and other aquatic biota) suggests that sediment re-suspension and associated increased metal exposures from the dredging and disposal project has contributed to oyster mortalities.

“Rio Tinto hired a private ecotoxicology firm to undertake oyster testing in Gladstone harbour in 2012, but the results which were very clearly not good for the oysters remained suppressed,” Dr Landos claimed.

He explained that oysters are routinely used to assess toxicity of water and as “sentinels for accumulation of metals”.

While Queensland health authorities have failed to act, their NSW counterparts issued an immediate health alert  following the discovery of contaminated oysters in Botany Bay after the toxic algae outbreak there.

They warned against eating oysters, clam, crabs and abalone, and an environmental medicine specialist, Dr Andrew Jeremijenko, believes similar warnings should have been issued previously at Gladstone.

 Dr Jeremijenko has also called for the monitoring of oysters in Gladstone waters following the continuing controversy over the health of local seafood and other marine animals.

Dredging has been blamed as the most likely cause of the fish disease by Dr Landos, but this has been denied by Gladstone Ports Corporation and Fisheries Queensland which both blame the floods two years ago.

Dr Jeremijenko also believes the dredging and the disturbance of toxic compounds in the silt is responsible, and he has also warned that extreme cases of toxic algae poisoning could result in human fatality.

He told The Telegraph yesterday that monitoring should be conducted for dangerous algae, including the type which produces paralytic shellfish poisoning (PSP) as found in Botany Bay.

“There should be a program of monitoring the Gladstone oysters for toxins such as heavy metals and PSP toxins, but currently this is either not being done or the data is not being made public.

“ In Gladstone Harbour, despite far greater environmental pollution and industrial activity than Botany Bay, there are no warnings about the oysters and whether they are safe to eat.

“What we now know is that an independent scientist has found them to be affected.

“ Gladstone harbour has had multiple toxic algal blooms associated with high turbidity and high nutrient levels, but the algae associated with these blooms has not always been identified.

 “PSP can be fatal in extreme cases and children are more susceptible.

“Despite destruction of oyster habitat, diseased oyster shells and collapse of stock, the State’s willingness to monitor and protect the oysters in the harbour, and the people that eat them, is lacking”.

Dr Jeremijenko said another study in Gladstone Harbour a decade ago during a previous dredging program had also found that oysters were taking up toxins such as heavy metals, arsenic and aluminium and “the closer to the dredging, the worse it was”.

“The authorities should be lobbied now to take appropriate measurements and do this as part of the UNESCO- recommended Gladstone Enquiry,” he said.