It seems every time we turn around we're hit with bad news about our food supply. It's always particularly disheartening when the news is in regard to a food that's supposedly a healthy choice, such as mercury in fish.

After learning about the problems with levels of mercury in fish, we are then left with having to figure out which fish have a problem with mercury, how much is actually safe to eat, and one can't help but start wondering how much we and our children have consumed already.

Scientists have linked the cumulative effect of mercury to many neurological disorders, including autism. Digging deeper only creates more worries... Turns out if your child was vaccinated prior to 2001, a preservative called "Thimerosal" was added to the Hepatitis B and the HiB vaccine. Thimerosal just happens to be the second most toxic metal on the planet, second only to uranium and guess what... where there's thimerosal there's mercury.

So, basically what we're finding out is that if mothers ate certain fish during pregnancy, if our children were vaccinated prior to 2001, and if we've been serving too much of the wrong fish for dinner, we've unknowingly exposed our children to mercury.

Well, there's nothing any of us can do about what's already happened, but we certainly can educate ourselves now to limit mercury exposure. Below are the most recent findings regarding recommendations about mercury in fish:

• Do not eat shark, swordfish, king mackerel or tilefish, which can have significant mercury levels.
• Eat no more than 12 ounces a week of fish lower in mercury, such as salmon, shrimp and canned light tuna.
• Canned albacore, or "white: tuna has more mercury than canned light tuna.
• Check advisories for the safety of fish caught in local waters.

More information about the risks of mercury in fish is available from the FDA at (888) SAFEFOOD or www.cfsan.fda.gov. Or search for the term "omega-6" at www.americanheart.org for a breakdown of mercury content in different types of fish.