**1. Introduction**

Marine pollution has received great attention a long time ago. In 1959, the first international conference on marine pollution problems was held in Berkley (United States) [1]. This problem is of great importance because the oceans have become the place of deposit and storage of a large part of the waste of all kinds, produced by man. These residues drain into the main river arteries and are transported by this means to their final destination in the marine environment. An important role in the transport of pollutants occurs through the lower layers of the atmosphere, which by precipitation or deposition reach the marine environment.

Mercury is, in very small amounts in seawater, a poison and a danger to life processes. Where an enrichment of this metal occurs, catastrophic consequences occur. It is a ubiquitous environmental toxicant. It exists in three forms, elemental (Hg(0)), inorganic (Hg2+), and organic forms. Hg (0) takes a liquid form at room temperature but readily evaporates into mercury vapor. Hg2+ occurs naturally in the environment in the form of divalent cationic salts of mercury, such as HgCl2 and Hg(OH)2, among others. Among the three forms, organic mercury, primarily methylmercury (MeHg), is the most dangerous form.

Methylmercury is a bioavailable form and can bioaccumulate through food webs. Shellfish consumption, especially fish consumption, is the main source of human exposure to MeHg. In 1956, "Minamata methylmercury poisoning" (MPM) was recognized, this being the first incident in the world, although there were some events in which several people had suffered direct health damage from exposure to mercury. organic mercury in a laboratory or factory [2].

According to Yokoyama [2], MPM is a neurological syndrome that was caused by the ingestion of fish and shellfish contaminated by methylmercury compounds, generated in the acetaldehyde production process. The first and second outbreaks of this type of disease in Japan were caused by effluent discharged from a Shin-Nippon Chisso Hiryo (hereinafter referred to as Chisso) factory in Minamata, Kumamoto Prefecture, and a Showa Denko factory in Kanose Town, Prefecture of Niigata, respectively.

MeHg is a stable organic mercury compound and is the most toxic form of mercury in the environment not only for humans but also for wildlife (Wolfe et al. 1998, Henriques et al. 2015, in [2]). Because methylmercury is lipid-soluble, it crosses the blood-brain barrier and accumulates in the brain. Methylmercury in the brain causes lysis of central nervous system cells, resulting in irreversible, permanent cell damage (Rabenstein 1978, in [2]). Therefore, MPM is widely recognized as a disorder in the brain, while Shiraki (1979, in [2]) suggested that MPM produces lesions not only in the brain but also in the vascular and endocrine systems.

In 2005, the European Environmental Bureau and the Mercury Policy Project formed "The Zero Mercury Working Group" (ZMWG), an international coalition of more than 95 public interest non-governmental organizations defending the environment and health. from more than 52 countries. The ZMWG strives to eliminate mercury supply, demand, and emissions from all anthropogenic sources, in order to minimize the presence of mercury in the global environment. Its mission is to advocate and support the adoption and implementation of a legally binding instrument containing the necessary obligations to eliminate, as far as possible, and if not minimize, the global supply and trade of mercury, its global demand, the release anthropogenic release of mercury into the environment, and human and wildlife exposure to mercury, these actions gave rise to the "Minamata Convention" [3].

In the agreement, in article 19, it establishes the research, development, and monitoring of the contaminant, especially with the elaboration of models and the geographically representative monitoring of the levels of mercury and its compounds in vulnerable populations and the environment, including biotic media such as fish, marine mammals, sea turtles, and birds, as well as assessments of the effects of mercury and its compounds on human health and the environment, as well as the social, economic, and cultural effects, especially with regard to vulnerable populations, among others [4].

*Mercury in the Colombian Caribbean: The Bay of Cartagena, A Model in Resilience DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.107240*
