A WORRIED MOTHER DISCOVERS THE SECRETS OF PESTICIDE TESTING

• Published in: Rachel's Democracy & Health News no. 832; p. N_A
• Main Author: Schulman, Audrey
• Format: Report
• Language: English
• Published: Annapolis Environmental Research Foundation 08.12.2005
• Subjects: Hazardous materials; Human exposure; Pesticides; Public health; Testing; United States > US

Three years ago, while my extended family was vacationing at my dad's cranberry farm, he mentioned that one of his fields would be sprayed that evening. There were five children under 10 in the house, and I was eight months pregnant. The field was 100 feet away. I asked my dad about the pesticides, but he said, "Don't worry. The government runs tests on the chemicals. They make sure they're safe." To get an idea of what's behind the curtain, consider the findings of Tyrone Hayes. A professor of developmental endocrinology at the University of California-Berkeley, Hayes published an article in BioScience (yes, it's peer-reviewed) in which he compared several previous experiments performed by others on the effect of atrazine on frogs' sexual differentiation. Seven of the studies performed on this popular corn pesticide were paid for by Syngenta, the manufacturer; nine others were funded by independent sources. Every one of the Syngenta-funded studies concluded that atrazine did not affect amphibian gonads, while all but one of the independent studies found that the chemical did have an effect, sometimes at the level of one- tenth part per billion in water. That's a stunningly small amount - about the same as dropping one tablespoon in almost 40 million gallons. The idea of testing on human volunteers, halted in 1998, has resurfaced thanks to industry pressure and a "sympathetic ear" in the form of EPA administrator Stephen Johnson. But the notion still has powerful opponents - Johnson's confirmation was blocked until he cancelled a plan to study pesticides' effects on low-income children - and controversy has surrounded EPA's draft rules on such tests, released this fall. A public-comment period on the rules ends Dec. 12.