Bangalore: The residues of a banned antibiotic drug have been found in the shrimps exported from India to U.S. which is causing serious concern among the authorities concerned, reports India Today.

The Institute of Environmental and Human Health at Texas Tech University examined 30 samples of seafood to find out whether any antibiotic drugs were mixed and according to the results about 10 percent contained antibiotic residues in quantities above the permitted limits.

In two of the samples (one from India and other from Thailand) nitrofuranzone, a banned antibiotic which has been classified as a ' probable cancer- causing' agent was found.

Officials at the Marine Products Export Development Authority (MPEDA) in Cochin pretended that they are not aware about the report and also claimed that all seafood are checked for the presence of antibiotics before exporting to some other countries. “Our standards call for zero- tolerance to antibiotic presence in our shipments," said an official.

Antibiotics are used by farmers in the food given to shrimps to fight against bacterial diseases and only few drugs authorized by International agencies such as the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) are used for this purpose. Nitrofuranzone is a banned drug, which affects the DNA cells and leads to toxicity and possibly cancer.

According to Indian officials if any sample is found positive for antibiotics, it is removed from export shipments.