From the BBC:
Swindon Borough Council has banned fish because a local man has a potentially fatal allergy.
Schools in the area have asked pupils not to bring in fish or fish based products with their packed lunches, supermarkets have been asked to remove all fish based products from their stores and destroy them and all fish and chip shops have been shut down as an emergency measure.
It is hoped that this will protect the man who suffers a severe anaphylactic reaction to any contact with fish. Some residents feel they have not been consulted and the whole area should not be affected "for one person".
But Swindon mayor, Cllr Theresa Page: "This is a life-threatening issue, anything less and we wouldn't need to be as drastic."
Work has commenced on a new channel divert the fish laden River Ray further south away from the town and the council will also be scanning aerial photographs to identify ponds potentially contained fish and contacting property owners with removal requests.
Snowy
4 minutes ago
6 comments:
EU bans childbirth over fears of death
I have heard this sort of thing justified on the grounds of "well if it saves one life, then it's worth it".
Bayard,
As someone who's daughter has a peanut allergy, we think this stuff is over the top. If you're careful (e.g. a little supervision when they're young from teachers at dinner time) you'll be fine.
The River Ray starts near Swindon's legendary Coate Water (with its ghostly 1920's Olympic diving-board above the dark green water below).I doubt whether the Ray gets deep enough to be "fish-laden".
This is the second river-based disagreement this week: the other was about the effects of river erosion in old Tblisi.
If you were to widen the focus a bit to Oxfordshire, you might include the other River Ray in Otmoor, the efforts to straighten and embank which led to England's last enclosure riots in the nineteenth century .
DBC,
You might be right. It's rather shallow - they run canal boats on it occassionally, but it's not particularly deep.
TS
On the other hand the Wikipedia entry for the River Ray Swindon says there are now nine species of fish upstream of the new Rivermead development showing how public sector improvements are having beneficial effects in this area. Doesn't say what species though: they could be including minnows and sticklebacks.Also none of the local angling guides give anything for the river upstream of Cricklade.
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