Chelsea, I have a fun, sad article for us to read through today. Oh, a fun, sad one. This is a new topic. Yeah, I don't think there's a better way to put it than that. This comes from ABC News, written by Julia Jacobo. I think that's how you say it. That's a good last name, Jacobo. We've heard Jacobo before. Oh, interesting. OK, maybe we've used her before. Maybe she's really honed in on our style. Good for her. Unless there's a lot of Jacobos. I remember I think it's a good last name.
Impression on you. Yeah. Anyhow, this was written and posted December 6th, 2024 at 12.53 p.m. Pacific Standard Time. Article title. Oh, that's recent. Several drugs, including fentanyl, bound in bottlenose dolphins in Gulf of Mexico. Scientists say. Oh, no. Scientists have detected fentanyl and other drugs and dozens of dolphins from the Gulf of Mexico, which could have large implications on the overall health of the ocean, they say.
The research began in September, 2020, where marine biologists conducting a routine boating survey to monitor the dolphin population in the Gulf of Mexico came across a deceased dolphin floating in the water, Darra Orback, an assistant professor at Texas A&M University Corpus Christi's Marine Biology Program and co-author of the study told ABC News. The scientists could tell that the dolphins had just died because its tail was still moving. That's morbid.
I did not know the tail kept moving once it died. Orback said so they decided to tow it back to campus to study. Yeah, that's really disturbing. I mean, I guess that's like running around with it, like a chicken with a head cut off. But I assume they do that. That's the saying. I don't think anybody cut the dolphins head off, though. Yeah, but you think that's the drugs. Do you think that's the drugs? No, I have my suspicions, but I'll hold my suspicions.
OK, years later, when graduate student Makayla Ginn needed dolphin tissue samples for her research on hormones, the biologists retrieved some blubber from that dolphin to study. Orback said, what a weird thing. And the weird thing is I'm saying Orback said, there's no quotes. So I don't know how they I don't know. It's kind of playing fast and loose with the rules. Jacobo, why? Jacobo needs no authority. The researchers asked him to lose. Yeah, that's just the Jacobo way.
The researchers then teamed up with Texas A&M Corpus Christi biochemist Hussain Abdullah, who lent out his laboratory for the marine biologist to run an untargeted analysis to see just what was inside these tissues. I'm really curious what she was studying. If her question was who dolphins do drugs. Like, I feel like I want to know a bit more. And why did she pick that dolphin? Yeah, well, it's because it was it's easy pickings. It's it's dead cells. That's already.
You don't even have to sit through the the tail still going. I didn't mean to laugh at that. But I can really hear your excuse. OK. An untargeted analysis involves an instrument to indicate whether there are chemicals in the tissue. Christiana Whitmack, a toxicologist at Precision Toxicological Consultancy and co-author of the paper told ABC News. Although they were looking for hormones, thousands of compounds were generated within the analysis.
Researchers were especially shocked when they selected three specific compounds they thought would be unlikely to find in dolphins. Fentanyl, a muscle relaxant and sedative. And fentanyl, a muscle relaxant and a sedative. Man, they're even to Kobo. You got to learn about the Oxford comma. It makes more sense. I'm asleep to Kobo. And found that the sample tissue contained traces of all three. For her honor student undergraduate project, it's an undergraduate project. Anya Ocampos.
Why are they just testing the dolphin for the three substances they were least expecting to find in a dolphin? Like, why? That's a good question. It doesn't make any sense. Why? You would do that. I guess that's why it's an undergraduate. Continue on.
For her honor student undergraduate project, Anya Ocampos then ran any nine dolphin samples through a mass spectrometer, 83 of which were from biopsies of live dolphins located in Laguna Madra, a shallow lagoon near Corpus Christi Bay in South Texas. Fentanyl was the most prevalent of the drugs tested, found in 24 of the samples the researchers found.
That's of 83. Not only did all the dead samples test positive for at least one of the drugs, but some of them were from historic samples taken from the Mississippi Sound in 2013, which suggests the drugs have been in the Gulf of Mexico's waterways for a long period of time, Orback said. In addition, dolphins don't drink water, Orback said. The marine mammal obtains the majority of its hydration from its prey. Therefore, those animals would likely also have these contaminants in their system.
Well, yeah, but like it's probably in the water. And I'm assuming that dolphins absorb things from the water. Do they not? But yeah, yeah, I'm just trying to wrap my head around what that would imply. Their findings, like how much fentanyl would have to be in the water for it to absorb into them. Well, I guess they haven't said how much they found. They just say it's there. Yeah. And like, where would it like, why would people just be dumping fentanyl into the water?
Maybe it's people flushing fentanyl down the toilet, like medication. Yeah. Yeah, actually, that's a good point. If medication does expire, you're supposed to technically take it back to the pharmacy, but I do think people flush them. I think so as well. But maybe Jacobo tells us. Hopefully Jacobo. I see our first quote. So let's we're approving quote. So it's possible that this is a widespread and longstanding prevalent issue that simply has not been addressed. End quote, she said.
If you're quoting for the first time, you can't say she just for those of you who are learning as we're talking, the drugs and other contaminants could be coming from a number of places, including dermal contact or the water itself. Yeah, exactly what Max said. So do we think people who are selling fentanyl are writing the dolphins? Potentially, I will speculate at the end.
Drugs being thrown overboard since they are located so close to the Mexican border, agricultural runoff or human waste could also be sources of the chemicals or back said. The dolphin found in 2020 was located adjacent to Robstown County, the location of the largest liquid fentanyl drug bust in US history in 2023. OK, I mean, I might explain that.
Quote, this is something that we really need to monitor with time so that we need to make sure that we're not seeing increases in fentanyl in infant and all concentrations. I guess I have to say it because in the quote end quote, what Max said. I mean, how did he dispose of that liquid fentanyl? It's a good question. Just right into the water. The ocean gets rid of everything. Yeah, just washes away and then it's gone.
There have never been any studies to show that what the long term effects of pharmaceuticals are in marine mammals or back said, although the traces found were low amounts, the water pollution is the latest in a series of stressors of marine mammals are facing. Quote, these are animals are subjected to constant noise pollution, vessel traffic, dredging, algae bloom, oil spills, chemical spills.
When you add more and more factors at some point, the animals so susceptible that they can't respond it end quote. Jacobo had a lot of spelling mistakes. But they're all within the quotation. So I don't know if it was how the person was saying it was wrong. I love the final. Yeah, they can't respond. Anyhow, that's the end of quote end of article. OK, I have been waiting to say this. OK, I have a theory. As dolphins are the only their animals on the earth that like have sex for pleasure.
Right. Did anyone think that maybe they also do drugs for pleasure? Oh, they do. I believe they use puffer fish to get high. It also fentanyl, right? And fentanyl. Yeah, right. Right. The lesser known of the dolphin highs. Yeah, that's my suspicion here. That's my suspicion, too. They didn't seem to question any dolphins about this or take any urine samples. So I just don't know for sure. Yeah, I guess Jacobo. Well, Jacobo wasn't doing the analysis, I guess.
No, she was just right in the way that only Jacobos know how to. Yeah, maybe she didn't ask for her questions. Yeah, but that does raise a lot of questions, mostly like what research were they doing and why did they look for the things that they really didn't expect? Was that just supposed to be a control group in that situation?
Yeah. And I would also be curious if this is just like a Gulf of Mexico issue or if it's like the entire ocean in general, if it's just the coastal cities in the US, like there's a bunch of different ways if you take this. Well, I hope this just spreads outwards and they try to find out more. Maybe it's everything in the ocean that's covered in fentanyl. Yeah. And in any event, like dolphins are highly communicative.
So if these ones are getting high, they're probably talking to the other ones about getting high, too. Yeah, so they all know about it because they love to gossip. Everyone knows how to vote dolphins. Yeah. And in any event, we still have the orcas are maintaining their sobriety and taking down the yachts. So I don't think this concerns us too much. And it is a fun, sad story at the end of the day. Yeah. And what does this mean for the cocaine hippos? That's a good question.
They're kind of in a different area. Does anyone tested them? I wonder if they're full of things. No, yeah, I wonder if they're full of cocaine. Well, I think we always kind of just assumed, didn't we? Maybe we did. Actually, now that you and maybe that's why they've never tested for it. Probably because they assume we're testing here for things he don't assume. Yeah. I would think that's not there. But it's not supposed to be there. Yeah.
OK. But yeah, it's weird, too, because like a lot of drugs do end up in the ocean because like they're run by boat. And if somebody gets busted or crashes, they just dump it into the water. But yeah, fentanyl is not something I don't think that's shipped by boat because it's in such small quantities that you need it that it's pretty easy to get across any border. Maybe it's just someone who's maybe they've been stuffing it in the dolphins. Yeah, that's another thing.
Or maybe they're just doing it loose and crazy like Jacobo is writing this article is just their drop in fentanyl all over the place. Maybe, you know what, actually, maybe the drug dealers plans are to just fully put enough in water so that it'll get you high. And then you're in all water. That's like a supervillain. It is. You cut them off at a certain point. Oh, yeah. And then you take. Yeah, you just stop adding it at a certain point where you're like, OK, these people are all addicted.
I'm also wondering how you yourself avoid getting addicted. Well, more the reason to not drink water, I think, is lessen in this fringy mini. I don't know what what drink do we endorse at this point? Whoever pays somebody pay us. It's not going to be water. Big water is not doing it. Maybe just drink plastic. It's it's yeah, we're going that way. I don't know. You guys put me on the spot here. You've got 48 hours. You think of something for us to get endorsed by by. Yeah.