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TITLE: The cell from hell Toxic algae that thrive on pollutants are killing fish, making people sick, and spreading nationwide

BYLINE: Michael Satchell

EST. PAGES: 3

DATE: 07/28/97

DOCID: USN23495

SOURCE: U.S. News & World Report; USN

SECTION: U.S. News; PAGE: 26-28

(Copyright 1997)

Retired North Carolina fisherman David Jones struggles with symptoms similar to those of several chronic afflictions: the mental confusion of Alzheimer's, the physical crippling of multiple sclerosis, the wasting of AIDS. But Jones has none of these. Doctors say all the evidence points to a neurological assault by algae.

Jones is one of about 100 North Carolina victims--fishermen, commercial divers, marine construction workers--who appear to have been poisoned by pfiesteria, a toxic alga found in the state's eastern rivers and estuaries. The victims' symptoms can include open sores, nausea, memory loss, fatigue, disorientation, and the near-total incapacitation suffered by Jones.

Pfiesteria was first discovered in 1991 and has since killed hundreds of millions of fish in North Carolina. State workers have used bulldozers to clear piles of dead menhaden from the beaches. A 1995 outbreak wiped out 14 million fish, temporarily closed parts of the Neuse River, and put 364,000 acres of shellfish beds off limits. Since then, the problem has been spreading. Around the country, outbreaks of pfiesteria and other harmful algal blooms known as red or brown tides are devastating marine life and posing risks for fishermen in bays and estuaries. Last summer, 20,000 rockfish in a Maryland fish farm on the Chesapeake Bay were killed by the organism. Earlier this month, "very, very concerned" Maryland officials launched a $250,000 emergency study of what is causing pfiesteria-type lesions on fish in the lower Pocomoke River, which empties into the Chesapeake Bay.

Dead sea cows. In the past 25 years, more than 35 poisonous algae outbreaks have killed or sickened fish, shellfish, marine mammals, seabirds, underwater vegetation--and people. On the eastern tip of Long Island, a brown tide has wiped out a $20 million bay-scallop industry. In the past two years, a red tide on Florida's west coast has killed 150 manatees, about 10 percent of the state's sea cow population. And in Texas, the Corpus Christi area has been plagued for seven years with a brown tide that kills eelgrass and other underwater vegetation. Their habitat destroyed, the fish have disappeared and, with them, many of the tourists.

Scientists view these problems as an urgent warning of the declining health of the nation's 127 ecologically vital and commercially valuable bays and estuaries. Increasing development of coastal areas is sending more sewage effluent, farm runoff, and factory wastewater flowing into bays and estuaries, triggering poisonous algal blooms on all three coasts.

Pfiesteria is a nasty little customer that some biologists have dubbed the "cell from hell." The alga is a dinoflagellate, a class of single-celled aquatic organisms that exhibit both plant and animal characteristics. Most of the time the cells remain in a hard, cystlike condition in the sediment of bays and estuaries.

But when fish swim by, the organisms swell and transform themselves into aggressive ambush predators with twin, whiplike tails called flagella that propel the killers toward their prey. They then release a toxin that is 1,000 times more powerful than cyanide. Even in minute quantities, the poison is deadly to fish, dispatching a guppy in 10 minutes and a 20-pound striped bass in four hours. Stricken fish gasp for oxygen and swim upside down or in circles. The toxin also causes the distinctive oozing red sores found both on fish and on humans who have been in direct contact with the organism. The microscopic attackers feed on the dying fish, reproduce furiously, then change shape when sated and return to dormancy in the sediment. Although attacks on humans are far more rare, the organism does pose significant risks to fishermen or people in prolonged contact with pfiesteria. Laboratory tests show a voracious appetite for human blood, and its neurotoxin is powerful enough to harm humans. JoAnn Burkholder, a scientist at North Carolina State University in Raleigh, discovered the microbe, along with her assistant. Both experienced severe neurological symptoms in 1993 after inhaling the toxin in their lab. The potential threat to humans recently prompted131 physicians in the New Bern, N.C., area to petition Vice President Al Gore for federal help to combat what they called "a truly threatening environmental issue." Their action reflects the growing frustration in North Carolina over the state's inability to find answers.

North Carolina's pfiesteria problem has roots in its booming economy. Urban areas like Raleigh-Durham and Charlotte are expanding. Large numbers of well-off retirees, eager to live near the water, have settled along the inland coastal region. Tourists are flocking to the mountains and beaches. Forests and marshlands, which filter pollutants and act as buffer zones, are being rapidly replaced by highways, golf courses, subdivisions, and strip malls. Along with all this growth has come an increase of pollutants rich in nitrogen, phosphorus, and other nutrients, flowing into creeks and rivers that feed the Albemarle-Pamlico Sound. This has triggered the pfiesteria algal blooms that have been decimating fish populations since 1991. These outbreaks are of deep concern because Albemarle-Pamlico Sound, the nation's second-largest bay after the Chesapeake, provides half of the nursery waters for fish spawned on the East Coast between Maine and Florida.

Scientists and environmentalists seeking answers to the algal assault believe much of the blame lies with the industrial-scale hog farming that has mushroomed in the eastern part of the state. A decade ago, North Carolina was the nation's seventh-largest hog producer. Today, it is second, just behind Iowa. Last year, more than 16 million porkers were raised between Interstate 95 and the Outer Banks. Hundreds of millions of gallons of untreated, nutrient-rich hog feces and urine produced at these loosely regulated factory farms are stored in earthen lagoons that sometimes leak or collapse. In 1995, for example, 25 million gallons of liquid swine manure--more than twice the volume of the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Prince William Sound--flowed into the New River after a lagoon was breached.

Local officials, environmental groups, and rural residents in North Carolina, fed up with the malodorous impact of the hog industry and its contribution to pfiesteria outbreaks, are pushing for stronger zoning powers and other measures to regulate hog factories and their growth. Besieged by criticism, the National Pork Producers Council says it is researching better methods of manure disposal.

Getting worse. Negative publicity about pfiesteria has spurred hundreds of calls to state offices from people wondering if it is safe to vacation in North Carolina. Tourism officials say there is cause for concern, not alarm. The threat is limited to the inland waters of Albemarle-Pamlico Sound and its tributary rivers, and these are being closely monitored. The organism has not caused problems on the ocean side of the Outer Banks or elsewhere in the state. Areas where kills have occurred in the Neuse River estuary and elsewhere have been temporarily closed to fishing, and people have been warned not to enter the water. Says senior scientist Donald Anderson of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts:It isn't time to cancel your North Carolina vacation or sell your property, but pfiesteria reflects a much bigger problem that's getting worse." Solutions would include better sewage treatment, controlling farm runoff, and improved wetlands protection. Among the experimental strategies available to attack harmful algal blooms is use of algicidal bacteria, parasites, and viruses.

Environmentalists are frustrated because they feel early signs of trouble were ignored. In the six years since Burkholder discovered the organism and warned of its devastating consequences, officials in the state's Department of Environment, Health and Natural Resources have belittled her scientific credibility, downplayed the threat, and failed to attack the problem aggressively. They dismissed her pollution-cause conclusion as "specious" and told her to return when she had 10 years of confirming data. "No state likes bad news, and they have tried to discredit me and bury my data," says Burkholder. She and others suspect--but cannot prove--a connection between official foot dragging and a desire to protect the commercial fishing, tourism, and hog industries, which pump over $10 billion a year into the state's economy. But Debbie Crane, spokeswoman for the state environmental agency, argues otherwise. "Bureaucracy by nature is slow to respond," says Crane. "Unfortunate things have happened in the past but now we're working hard to beat this thing." North Carolina and Maryland are currently trying to do just that, but with 75 percent of the population now living within 50 miles of the Great Lakes and the nation's coastlines, the toxic algae will keep regulators worrying about where the next outbreaks will occur.

ART: Picture: The toxic alga pfiesteria in action (H. Glasgow); Picture: Scientists are studying whether pfiesteria killed fish in the Pocomoke River on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. In North Carolina, authorities needed bulldozers to clear beaches of dead fish. (Erik Freeland--Matrix for USN&WR); Picture: Fisherman David Jones, who suffers from pfiesteria poisoning, and his wife, Margaret, in New Bern, N.C. (Jim Lo Scalzo for USN&WR)