Hai, how are you? Many sea creatures in the Caribbean are on drugs these days.Image: www.imago-images.de
Sharks in the Caribbean have tested positive for various substances – even coke. A problem not only for the animals, but also for us.
April 3, 2026, 9:17 p.mApril 3, 2026, 9:17 p.m
Dariusch Rimkus / watson.de
A shark on coke could actually be a template for a joke or for a wonderfully trashy horror film. The animal with the razor-sharp teeth, which we now actually know is not as aggressive as depicted in “Jaws”, for example, has a good time in the Caribbean with a little white powder and then mutates into a wild monster.
All the funnier when caffeine comes into play too. In fact, both substances were recently detected in sharks in the Caribbean. But there’s not much of a joke left when you consider the reasons – and the dramatic consequences.
Painkillers also proven
An international team of researchers from the Bahamas, Brazil and Chile has made an alarming discovery: Sharks in the Caribbean carry traces of cocaine, caffeine and painkillers in their blood. The study focused on 85 sharks, 28 of which were found to contain medication or drug residues.
The animals were studied around the island of Eleuthera, one of the more remote areas of the Bahamas.
According to the study, the sharks were tested for a number of psychoactive chemicals, four of which – cocaine, caffeine, as well as the painkillers acetaminophen (found in paracetamol) and diclofenac – were detected at varying levels in Caribbean reef sharks, Atlantic nurse sharks and lemon sharks.
It’s like Science Alert writes, the first time that caffeine has been detected in sharks worldwide and the first time that cocaine has been found in the organisms of sharks in the Bahamas. Caffeine was the most frequently detected substance in the sharks, while cocaine was only detected in two of them.
Tourism is partly responsible – especially cruise ships
But how exactly can sharks suddenly get stuck on chemical substances?
The researchers write about this in their study:
“Pharmaceuticals and illicit drugs are increasingly identified as pollutants of particular concern in marine environments, particularly in areas undergoing rapid urbanization and tourism-driven development.”
There are numerous popular diving and cruise destinations around Eleuthera, where the sharks were studied. The researchers suspect that untreated wastewater from cruise ships and other tourist activities contributes significantly to pollution.
According to Science Alert, a similar problem has already been identified in the Arctic, where cruise ships release antibiotics and other pharmaceutical substances into the water that affect marine life there.
In the case of cocaine, the sharks may have come into contact with the substances by biting on packets of drugs that got into the watersaid biologist Natascha Wosnick from the Universidade Federal do Paraná in Brazil, who was involved in the study Science News explained.
The tourism sector in the Bahamas has been booming for years, according to 2025 Travel Market Report 12.5 million people visited the Caribbean country – a record. Accordingly, 10.6 million – i.e. 86.5 percent of tourists – traveled to the country on cruise ships, doubling compared to 2019.
Water contamination also affects people
The effects of pollution are worrying not only for the sharks themselves, but also for humans. The researchers warn in the study that the substances not only pose a “continuous risk to marine biodiversity”.
They could also enter the human body through consumption of seafood or through contact with water.
The exact impact on sharks still needs to be studied in more detail. However, initial studies suggest that the animals suffer from increased stress and increased energy consumption due to exposure to drugs and medication. as their bodies try to break down the pollutants.
The researchers emphasize that further studies are urgently needed to understand the long-term effects of pollution on marine life. The detected substances have the “potential to affect fundamental physiological processes in marine organisms,” they write.
The study shows that even remote places that are supposedly little touched by tourism, such as the Bahamas Islands, are affected by pollution. It is a wake-up call that not only affects sea creatures, but also us humans.
(with additions from Jul)