Although shark fin soup is quite popular and is a delicacy in Asian countries it has no nutritional benefit and is actually proven to be harmful to your health in the long run. There are many claims that shark fin soup may help with arthritis but in addition to helping with arthritis shark fins are full of the harmful poison mercury ("Shark Fin Soup- An Eco-Catastrophe?", SFGate.com). Also shark fins supposedly have little or no nutritional value ("An Eco-Catastrophe?).
According to a news article featured on Chinadaily.com, the high levels of mercury found in the expensive shark fin soup may actually lead to sterility. In addition to sterility "shark fin [soup] can also cause central nervous system problems and kidney diseases" ("Watch Out For Shark Fin Soup", Chinadaily.com). The mercury levels in shark meat are derived from the ocean's food chain. "Lots of marine organisms have been contaminated by mercury polluted sea water" and because the shark is at the very top of the oceans food chain it eats "numerous polluted small fishes and organisms" thus leaving the shark highly contaminated ("Watch Out").
With there being numerous health downsides to eating shark fin soup it quickly becomes obvious how unnecessary it is to eat this soup. If enough people can be turned away from the soup due to its health side-effects then we can greatly diminish the demand for shark fins, thus reducing the need to kill for their fins. So, is killing vast numbers of sharks to eat their mercury riddled fins worth risking our oceans' Eco-systems for? Or worth pushing sharks to the brink of extinction? I didn't think so.
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