Coordinated climate action with mercury emission reduction strategies may help mitigate MeHg exposure risks, at least over the Asian region but likely also over other regions of the world.

Environmental factors that are changing with climate warming are influencing the accumulation of neurotoxic methylmercury (MeHg) in human food webs. In this work, we explore the changing MeHg exposure risk in Asia by looking at climate-mercury-food-health couplings using observations and machine learning methods. Although the exact environmental process is still uncertain, the data suggest that climate warming-related changes in photo- and thermo-induced mercury redox biochemical processes contribute to increase MeHg concentrations in freshwater wild fish over China. The article further explores the resulting implications on food safety and health over Asia. The results suggest that coordinated climate action with mercury emission reduction strategies may better help mitigate MeHg exposure risks, at least over the Asian region but likely also over other regions of the world. Mengjie Wu, Xinda Wu, Alfonso Saiz-Lopez, Paul J. Blanchfield, Hongqiang Ren, and Huan Zhong. Climate change amplifies neurotoxic methylmercury threat to Asian fish consumers. PNAS. https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2421921122