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Science

Sharks Near Brazil Test Positive For Cocaine (bbc.co.uk) 40

Posted by EditorDavid from the this-is-your-brain-on-sharks dept.
RockDoctor (Slashdot reader #15,477) writes: The BBC are reporting sharks have tested positive for cocaine. Thirteen sharpnose sharks which were captured off the coast near Rio de Janeiro. They were tested for the drug in liver and muscle tissue samples — and returned positive results at concentrations as much as 100 times higher than previously reported for other aquatic creatures.

The research was published in Science of the Total Environment. The little-known "sharpnose" sharks were examined because they spend their entire lives in coastal waters. This makes them more likely to be exposed to drugs from human activities than the more cinematic species starring in "Cocaine Shark" or "Cocaine Sharks", two recent productions on the subject featuring hammerheads and tiger sharks (the "trash cans of the sea").

The likeliest source is effluent from drug processing labs inland, though the snorting population of Rio may have added their contribution into the sewers too...

Whether cocaine is changing the behaviour of the sharks is not known. Perhaps it would affect their aim with their head-mount lasers, bringing closer their conquest of the land with it's tasty, tasty humans. Hollywood, hopefully, as the answers.
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Sharks Near Brazil Test Positive For Cocaine More

Sharks Near Brazil Test Positive For Cocaine

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  • Damn (Score:5, Funny)

    by Kernel Kurtz ( 182424 ) on Saturday July 27, 2024 @10:38PM (#64660862)
    Bears and now sharks too! https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]

    • It's kind of buried in this report, but apparently these sharks also tended to prefer Clapton-heavy playlists [youtu.be] on their Zunes.

    • It's not complex. Pour drugs into the oceans ; ocean life has detectable levels of drugs in their tissues (muscle and liver, specifically).

      It is sort of a testament to the sensitivity of modern detection and analytic equipment. But since state of the art in the 1970s could identify drug source region from cigarette-butt residues, I'm not surprised. (Dad was an industrial chemist when I was at school, and he was more interested in these things than I was. But I read the papers he brought back from work - it

  • "100 times higher than previously reported for other aquatic creatures." Does this mean that there's a minimum drug level for aquatic creatures? First the tuna-mercury problem, now this? What about the shrimp? Are oysters actually a romantic food, or do they count as drugging your date? What about seaweed wraps? Can they be smoked? What about seabottom silt? Does that mean that spa mud-baths can offer things that would show up on a drug test? Are seashells the next narcotic? What about beach sand? Also, typ

    • Re:Is sea salt being tested? (Score:4, Interesting)

      by quonset ( 4839537 ) on Sunday July 28, 2024 @07:04AM (#64661278)

      Does this mean that there's a minimum drug level for aquatic creatures?

      It should be zero since drugs are man-made item.

      That said, it would make sense. Sharks are at the top of their food chain. They eat other fish and whatnot that have eaten bunches of smaller fish and whatnot. The cocaine and other drugs get more concentrated the higher up you go.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by dimko ( 1166489 )
      I can already see excuses on drug tests: but i have not done anything illegal, i have been to Thailand and ate a shark and later I learned it may have contained cocaine. I swear!
    • No. It means that someone is going around testing sharks for cocaine. Apparently, we have run out of things to test for.
      • > Apparently, we have run out of things to test for The results for people are already in.
      • The sharks were chosen (verb, active) because as near-shore living organisms they were expected to sample the coastal waters quite thoroughly. They were being used as filters (of uncertain concentration factors) to sample the stretches of coast to assess the amount of both illegal drug manufacture (off low-population coasts) and use (off high-population coasts).

        No, it was not a random "let's spend some tax dollars" experiment. (What is Brazil's currency? Reals? Wiki : "Currency Real (R$) (BRL)" ) It was a

        • They should be testing for the solvents used in the production of cocaine. Those are cheap and discarded. Cocaine is recovered and sold.

          • They should be testing for the solvents used in the production of cocaine.

            According to the reports I've received - including at first hand from people made to work at gun-point in the cocaine processing "jungle" labs - tyhe main solvent used is, indeed, cheap and discarded. It's petrol (EN_US ; "gasoline"). Because it is cheap, and disposable.

            Chemically, in an ideal world, you might prefer an organic solvent with some electron lone pairs - so absolute ethanol, dimethyl ketone (acetone) or an etheric oxygen

    • Are oysters actually a romantic food, or do they count as drugging your date?

      Yes.

      No, that isn't intended to be a helpful answer. It just means you have to be very careful, all the time, on every date. That should be helpful.

      What about seabottom silt?

      The silt itself ... probably not much of an issue. Clays (phyllosilicate minerals have a very much higher surface area per gramme than silt minerals) or organic matter in the silt ... potentially more of an issue.

      Does that mean that spa mud-baths can offer thin

  • 30 years i waited to apply the meme, and you ruined it. dick

  • Coke boats that either sunk or were forced to dump some cargo have dropped tons of the stuff in highly concentrated form into the Florida coastal waters, usually still wrapped in plastic coated blocks. This has been going on gor many years.

    The sharks chomp up the stuff and then... no one knows (that I'm aware of). Who the fuck is going to chase down and start conducting tests on coked up sharks and how could you tell the difference between a coked up shark attack and a regular shark attack, anyway?

    • Coke boats that either sunk or were forced to dump some cargo have dropped tons of the stuff in highly concentrated form into the Florida coastal waters, usually still wrapped in plastic coated blocks. This has been going on gor many years.

      The sharks chomp up the stuff and then... no one knows (that I'm aware of). Who the fuck is going to chase down and start conducting tests on coked up sharks and how could you tell the difference between a coked up shark attack and a regular shark attack, anyway?

      The teeth marks have white residue around them?

  • No way those fishes can spend 24x7 hunting without a little help.

  • Those wild block parties at the beachfront, flashing colored lights, loud carnaval music, police showing up every now and then

  • If your bay gets bad news,
    you want ocean blues,
    cocaine

    Just half asleep while you snooze,
    gotta swim or you lose,
    cocaine

    When your laser turns rad,
    and you burn from the head,
    cocaine

    Cocaine
    Cocaine
    Cocaine

    Cocaine

  • impressive (Score:4, Funny)

    by kencurry ( 471519 ) on Sunday July 28, 2024 @12:04PM (#64661580)
    Holding down one nostril with a dorsal fin cannot be easy. hats off to these guys.

    • Gills are probably a pretty effective drug intake system.
      I guess that's where the '... up to the gills' expression comes from.

    • Obviously, the sharks cooperate - one uses it's fin to close one nostril of the other, then they reciprocate.

      If that doesn't make you very afraid, it should. Cooperative coke-snorting sharks. With, or without lasers on their heads.

  • Drug the sharks and they just lose their stuff and start swimming in circles. Next think you know some 90's teen show actor is fighting off sharks.....

  • Its name was Mia Wallace.

  • The source of the cocaine is completely speculative. Its possible it is all natural runoff from cocaine growing areas. And there is no evidence it matters.
    • The coca plant is native to upland areas at both sides of the Andes. The cocaine sharks were in the Atlantic ocean. That's an awful lot of dilution. But it's a line of defence to try.

      It is plausible that it is run-off from the Andes into the Atlantic. Alternatively, it could be run off form particular processing operations near the Atlantic shore, which by wildlife sampling they can narrow down the locations of, delivery/ operations schedules of, and never come close enough for the guards to see, let alone

  • I'll be reading though the responses again tomorrow. Just think of the possibilities! Who cares about the source material.
  • Sounds like people who ignore drug laws are also ignoring environmental waste discharge laws. I'm going to guess that occupational safety and health for their employees are probably lacking as well.

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