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By Ana B. Ibarra, California Healthline and Kaiser Health News
Lawmakers in several states are trying to ban a widely used pesticide that the Environmental Protection Agency is fighting to keep it on the market.
The pesticide, chlorpyrifos, kills insects on contact by attacking their nervous system.
Several studies have linked prenatal exposure to chlorpyrifos and birth weight, IQ, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and other developmental problems in the children. But the EPA in 2017 ignored the findings of its scientists and rejected a proposal made under the Obama administration to ban its use in fields and orchards.
Hawaii was the first state to adopt a total ban last year. Today, California, Oregon, New York and Connecticut are trying to do the same.
If California succeeds, the action of the rear guard could have a significant impact.
"If California succeeds, it's a big problem, because it's such a big state, the largest agricultural state," said Virginia Ruiz, Farmworker Justice's Director of Occupational Health and the Environment, a non-profit organization based in Washington, DC.
Earlier this year, congressional Democrats also introduced legislation to ban pesticides at the national level, but experts believe that states are more likely to succeed than Congress. Senator Candidate Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) Introduced a separate bill last week banning schools from serving pesticide-treated fruits and vegetables.
"I do not see this as something we should always be discussing," said Irva Hertz-Picciotto, an epidemiologist and director of the Center for Environmental Health Sciences at the University of California-Davis.
Hertz-Picciotto testified at the April 10 hearing of the California Senate Health Committee on the California bill to ban the use of the pesticide. She said more than three dozen studies have demonstrated a link between prenatal exposure to chlorpyrifos and developmental disorders, including autism symptoms.
"No studies have identified a level at which we can consider that it is safe," she told lawmakers.
Nearly two decades ago, the EPA, which regulates pesticides at the federal level, ordered that chlorpyrifos for residential use be removed from the market. But the chemical is still used on crops – including citrus fruits, almonds and grapes – and on golf courses and other non-farm environments.
Globally, several companies manufacture chlorpyrifos products. In the United States, the most recognized brands are Dursban and Lorsban, manufactured by Corteva Agriscience, formerly Dow AgroSciences.
Under the administration of President Barack Obama, the EPA proposed in 2015 a complete ban on chlorpyrifos, citing evidence of health risks. But in 2017, Scott Pruitt, director of the EPA of President Donald Trump, refused to ban it.
"Despite several years of study, the science of neurodevelopmental effects has still not been resolved," says EPA on its website. The agency did not return requests for comments.
Then, the US 9th Circuit Court of Appeal ordered that the pesticide be completely removed from the market last summer. The EPA opposes this decision.
"The EPA contradicts the findings of its own scientists," said Aseem Prakash, director of the Center for Environmental Politics at the University of Washington.
Prakash accused the EPA of serving the interests of the chemical industry to the detriment of the health of the people.
"It's weird," he added. "We have research."
Manufacturers see it differently. Carol Burns, a retired epidemiologist with the Dow Chemical Company, who started making chlorpyrifos in 1965, is now a consultant for Corteva Agriscience. Burns said during the hearing in the California Senate that many studies were linking neurodevelopmental problems in children with chemical compounds known as organophosphates, but not chlorpyrifos in particular.
"Chlorpyrifos is an organophosphate, but not all organophosphates are chlorpyrifos," she said. Science, she said, is not clear.
In addition, she said, some of these studies focused on children born in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Since then, children are less exposed to the chemical due to increasing restrictions on its use, said Burns.
Neither Corteva Agriscience nor the California Farm Bureau Federation would like to comment on this story.
Chlorpyrifos can be inhaled during application and drifting into neighboring areas, or ingested as residues in food. People can also be exposed through their drinking water if their wells have been contaminated.
A brief exposure may cause dizziness, nausea, and headache, while more acute intoxication may cause vomiting, tremors, and a loss of coordination, according to the National Pesticide Information Center. .
"The EPA contradicts the findings of its own scientists."
However, long-term exposure, even at low doses, is considered more harmful, especially for young developing brains. A study conducted in 2014 by Hertz-Picciotto and other UC-Davis researchers found that pregnant women living near chlorpyrifos-treated fields, mainly in the second trimester, were at high risk of giving birth. a child with autism spectrum disorder.
Fidelia Morales lives in Lindsay, California, a small town in Tulare County for 12 years. Her home is surrounded by orange groves, and the stench of freshly sprayed pesticides often floats in, especially during the summer, she said.
The more she learns about chlorpyrifos, the more she wonders if this has played a role in the behavioral problems of her eleven-year-old son. Her teachers regularly complain about her inability to concentrate and stay in class, she said. In grade four, he read in second grade.
"When I was pregnant, I was walking in the groves. I did not know that I could expose and expose my baby, "she said. "The irony is that I left Los Angeles partly to escape any pollution. I did not know that I would end up somewhere worse. "
Morales wants the pesticide to be banned.
During the hearing before the health committee, however, farmers told lawmakers that the state was already restricting the use of chlorpyrifos through the Department of Pesticide Regulation. Any additional restrictions should be left to the ministry, they urged.
On the basis of the department's previous recommendations, all counties in California have decided this year to impose strict restrictions on the application of chlorpyrifos.
Restrictions include an aerial spit ban. For land applications, farmers can not apply the pesticide within 150 feet of homes, businesses and schools. The ministry views the pesticide as a "toxic air contaminant" and believes the new restrictions will reduce its use, spokeswoman Charlotte Fadipe said.
The use of chlorpyrifos in the state has halved in the last decade, she said.
Angel Garcia, a community organizer in Tulare County with the Californians for Pesticide Reform group, said the new restrictions are not tough enough.
Those who are most at risk are largely low-income people of color living in agricultural areas, he said.
The restrictions "do not allow to create important protections for health," he said.
This story was produced by Kaiser Health News (KHN), which publishes California Healthline, an independent editorial service California Health Care Foundation. KHN is not affiliated with Kaiser Permanente.
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