Fish oil-Can It Be Healthy?
By Bryon Zirker
Eating fish reduces the precariousness of various
diseases including heart disease, diabetes, childhood
asthma and prostate cancer, among others.
Fish is a fixed diet for most Asians. The regular
Chinese person eats more than 20kg of seafood a year,
three times that of the consumption of Americans.
Fish is indeed an excellent food and is an ascendant
part of a healthy diet. It is lower in saturated fat,
generous in protein and unsaturated fat and potent
source of fatty acids.
More or less half of the human body's dry weight
contains protein, and that includes brain cells,
hair, nails, muscle and skin.
Among the various types of succulent fish, oily
cold-water fish like tuna, salmon, mackerel, sardines,
pilchards, anchovies and cod are truly known for
their health-giving properties due to their elevated
quantity of omega-3 fatty acids.
Omega-3 fatty acids first came into notability in the
decade of the 70s and researchers and nutritionists
touted ingesting up to four meals of fish a week to
reduce the uncertainty of diseases ranging from
childhood asthma to prostate cancer.
Eating oily fish has been found to benefit the heart.
It helps to lower cholesterol and triglyceride levels
and reduce blood pressure. Omega-3 fatty acids in
the fatty tissue of the fish are also anti-inflammatory
with anti-blood clotting actions.
Fish oils may also reduce the probabilities and
symptoms for other disorders including diabetes,
stroke, rheumatoid arthritis, asthma, inflammatory
bowel disease, ulcerative colitis, some cancers, and
psychological debility.
You can find different healthy ways to enjoy fish.
Some people steam, grill, stir-fry, poach or eat it
raw like sushi. Fish with darker meat such as sardines,
mackerel, salmon, tuna and herring contain more
omega-3 fatty acids than white fish. Besides fish,
other seafood such as scallops, calamari, trout, sea
perch and squid are also good sources of omega-3
fatty acids, albeit in smaller quantities.
While it is good to digest fish, it is also wise to
avoid those weighty in mercury levels. To much
mercury affects the nervous system, which can
cause numb or tingling fingers, lips and toes.
It delays walking in an infant and talking in children.
It causes muscle and joint pain as well as an elevated
risk of heart attack. If you enjoy catching and ingesting
your own fish, don't fish in tainted water. species that
feed on the bottom, such as catfish, may ingest more
pollutants.
Smaller fish such as sardines and anchovies are specially
put forth for eating because they naturally contain oils
that are innocuous in heavy metals such as mercury,
lead, cadmium and arsenic and environmental toxins
( e.g. pesticides, dioxin and PCBs ) than larger predatory
fish such as tuna and cod fish. Women who are pregnant,
women anticipating pregnancy and children up to six years
old had best select carefully the type of fish they eat.