OK, I looked it up on the web, and found a document that is much more detailed than any other information I saw previously. Additionally it comes in a bi-lingual French-English version:
http://www.spc.int/coastfish/Reports...tera_chap1.pdf
Quite a lot of good info. They also speak about the detection. Cats are more sensitive to ciguatera, and are sometimes used for the testing purpose (hope PETA is not watching this). See pages 37 to 43 for other detection methods.
Some precaution tips from the page 48:
Quote:
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To minimize the risk of contracting food poisoning,
the following precautions should be observed:
Avoid eating fish that have a local reputation for causing food poisoning (e.g. sharks, moray eel, red bass, bream, trevally, chinaman fish, grouper, etc.). Get advice from fishers about which fishing grounds are safe;
Be careful with large reef fish (i.e. over 10 kg), and avoid them if possible. Wherever feasible, select smaller fish since toxicity is often proportional to size;
Gut fish thoroughly. Do not eat the head, eggs, viscera or liver, which are more poisonous than the fillet;
Remember that freezing, cooking, smoking or any other method of preparation or seasoning does not eliminate the toxin;
Do not rely on flies, ants or coins to detect a poisonous fish — these techniques have misled many people. The poor cat is in fact more sensitive than humans;
After suffering from a case of fish poisoning, avoid eating any kind of fish or other seafood for at least a month and avoid alcoholic drinks;
Beware of areas that have a reputation for being ciguatera free. They can suffer an outbreak of microalgae and become potentially dangerous (the reverse is also true). Beware also of older fish;
There is no fish poisoning season. You can catch and eat a fish that contains enough toxin to give you food poisoning at any time of the year.
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The cost of the test kit from Cigua.com (
Cigua-Check Fish Poison Test Kit) is $10 per fish, so not really cheap.
