Ban Neurotoxic Organophosphate Pesticides from Food Crop Applications
Many farmers have lost loved ones to strange cancers, then read warning labels on bags of synthetics they have been using for pest management, frustrated, they had no idea these were acute human toxins, linked in evidence from high quality science research to being causal factors in many disease pathologies.
Regenerative Agriculture Practices Then Adopted
USDA sends scientists to farms to help owners of farms implement sustainable soil practices that boost productivity in terms of bushels per acre, without expensive chemicals with toxic exposure side effects
Systemic Pesticide Sterilizes Pest Species with 99% Less Chemical Applied
US Federal pesticide law amended in 1996, deal struck to repeal the Delaney Clause's ban on cancer-causing pesticides in processed foods in exchange for a provision mandating the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to conduct cumulative risk assessment, arguing that new law would force the end of highly neurotoxic organophosphate insecticides, a goal that has never been achieved. Organophosphate pesticides are widely used in agriculture, landscaping, and mosquito control, despite the known damage that the chemical causes to the nervous system and brain of humans, disproportionately harming small children and elderly people more because of smaller kidneys and livers in little kids, and decreased functions of the liver and kidneys in older adults, so our most important members of society are being harmed more by synthetic pest management chemicals, when safer systemic pesticides that sterilize the pest species work with thousands of times less chemical applied, only once applied, that prevent the pest species from reproducing, effective birth control or sterilization of pest species, slashes the use of toxic chemicals used to control pests, from thousands of dollars per acre, to use a few hundred dollars for thousands of acres protected as the pest species sterilized.
On Social Media, Tell Legislative People, "Please Ban Toxic Pesticides"
Encourage System Pest Sterilization
Tell Congress, FDA, and EPA that it is past time to stop the manufacture and use of all organophosphate pesticides, which damage the nervous system and brain, even at low levels of exposure, even tiny amounts of residues of these exceedingly toxic substances end up in the human body when people eat foods contaminated with these chemicals that do not wash off or become inactive when cooked, they are persistent harmful pollutants that damage nature, harm wildlife, and are analogs of chemical weapons that destroy the human nervous system.
Public Health Broadly Assaulted, Ozone Layer Damage Means More Skin Cancer
We are getting hit with microplastics, more UV from the sun because of Ozone layer damage from CFC released from pressurized canisters and leaking ac and fridge systems, disused, old, damaged, corroded, eventually all devices containing refrigerant gases leak, and these substances used as refrigerant gas are toxic to people and nature and react in the stratosphere not only with enormous greenhouse gas effect, but they also chemically react with the ozone layer, effectively deactivating the ozone layer, which doubles the amount of skin harmful, eye damages UV that reaches the surface of earth where people are exposed to higher UV levels as a result of CFC released, often unintentionally, but inevitably.
How about Isotopes, Radioactive Heavy Metals, Released from Nuclear Weapons Testing
Firmly established that asbestos exposure causes a specific kind of lung cancer, yet we see isotopes released by nuclear weapons testing causes a spike in cancers associated with exposure to those exact isotopes, e.g. radioactive heavy metals, and I am not even touching on DU rounds shot out of aircraft mounted machine gun multi barrel rapid fire volcan cannons. How about the radioactive and heavy metals released in coal power emissions. That miracle fireproofing asbestos turned out to be a giant public health harming debacle, even Johnson & Johson now being hit with thousands of lawsuits after it was made public that J&J has known since the 1950s that talc they have been using in baby powder contaminated with asbestos.
Slips through the Cracks, Leaking Refrigerant Gases, CFC's
Who carefully manages old disused AC systems or old disused fridges, how can we expect to recover chlorofluorocarbon refrigerant gases that easily leak and float away into the stratosphere where they further damage the ozone layer, making UV levels even higher over time, so more skin cancer melanoma. When tires on your car wear away the tread, all that volcanized rubber forms the largest emitter of microplastics, known as tire tread erosion products.
Organophosphate Pesticides are Nerve Agent Chemical Weapons
Exposure to Organophosphates blocks brain from breaking down acetylcholine, which hyper activates neurons until they start dying, a processed that causes extreme brain damage with even tiny amounts of exposure.
It is firmly established that widely used organophosphate pesticides in food production and other sites are severely toxic to a broad range of organisms. In what is known as their “classic” mechanism of action, they inhibit acetylcholinesterase (AChE), an enzyme that breaks down the neurotransmitter acetylcholine (ACh), particularly in neuromuscular junctions in the brain. Exactly the same way as many toxic chemical weapons.
Nazi Scientists Invented Organophosphates as Nerve Agents
Organophosphates are nerve agents, originally developed by the German company IG Farben (a conglomerate that included Bayer), which was “inseparably linked with the Nazi regime” and the Auschwitz concentration camp, as described by BASF, also a part of IG Farben.
Elaborate Loopholes Allow Toxic Organophosphate Use in Agriculture
The 1996 federal law, the Food Quality Protection Act, did not ban organophosphates, however, EPA negotiated many new restrictions that reduced the number of uses but still allowed widespread use and exposure. These restrictions established new risk assessment protocols that replaced the 1958 Delaney Clause's ban on cancer-causing pesticides in processed food under the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, which authorizes the Secretary of Health and Human Services to set pesticide tolerances (acceptable residues) for food commodities.
States Have Banned Organophosphate
Meanwhile, in the absence of a comprehensive ban on organophosphates, states in 2018-2021 began to weigh in on an individual organophosphate pesticide, chlorpyrifos, that was making national headlines because of its neurotoxic properties, adverse effects on the brain, and widespread use in food production. For example, five states used their authority to adopt more stringent standards than the federal government by banning the chemical in California, Hawai'i, Maine, Maryland, and New York.
US Never Ratified the Stockholm Convention in Congress
Prior to state action, in 2000, EPA had negotiated chlorpyrifos's voluntary withdrawal from the residential market with its manufacturer, Dow AgroSciences. (See more background at Pesticide Gateway on Pesticide Hazards and Safe Pest Management and here.) Internationally, the 12th meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COPs) to the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants (Stockholm Convention) added chlorpyrifos to Annex A, which commits the 186 signatory countries to eliminate production and use. The United States is not a party to the Stockholm Convention because the treaty has never been ratified by Congress.
Developmental Delays in Children, Lower IQ Scores
The new study showing adverse developmental effects to children's brains builds on earlier scientific work, a call from medical practitioners in 2018, and Congressional legislation to ban organophosphates. A group of leading toxics experts, who have called for a ban on organophosphate pesticides, published a paper in the journal PLOS Medicine on their research on organophosphate exposure during pregnancy and its impacts on child development.
They Harm Pregnant Women & the Fetus Even More
"There is compelling evidence that exposure of pregnant women to very low levels of organophosphate pesticides is associated with lower IQs and difficulties with learning, memory or attention in their children," said lead author Irva Hertz-Picciotto, PhD, professor of public health sciences, director of the University of California Davis Environmental Health Sciences Center, and researcher with the UC Davis MIND Institute, according to Science Daily.
Science Clear about Toxicity of Organophosphates
The study in PLOS Medicine evaluates current science on the risks of this class of compounds, produced by Corteva Agriscience (formerly Dow AgroSciences); its conclusions warn of the multitude of dangers of organophosphates for children, and makes recommendations for addressing these risks. The experts conclude that: (1) widespread use of organophosphate (OP) pesticides to control insects has resulted in ubiquitous human exposures; (2) acute exposures to OPs is responsible for poisonings and deaths, particularly in developing countries; and (3) evidence demonstrates that prenatal exposures, even at low levels, put children at risk for cognitive and behavioral deficits, and for neurodevelopmental disorders.
Harming Farm Workers & their Families Even More
Then there is the matter of disproportionate risk to farmworkers and farmworker children, who suffer elevated rates of harm from organophosphate pesticides, a classic example of environmental injustice or institutionalized racist public health and environmental policy. According to a 2024 study published by French and American authors in the journal Exposure and Health, not only do farmworker children test positive for organophosphate pesticides more frequently than non-farmworker children, but farmworker children also experience an increased frequency of DNA damage associated with the presence of organophosphate exposure. These results highlight the disparities in exposures and outcomes for children from vulnerable immigrant communities. Advocates note that as long as pesticides remain in use, farmworkers and their families will continue to shoulder a disproportionate share of the toxic effects of these chemicals.
More Evidence Organophosphates Harm Fetus of Pregnant Women
A California-based population study published in BMC Public Health finds that “7.5 [percent] of all pregnant people in California who gave birth in 2021 lived within 1 km [kilometer] of agricultural fields where OP pesticides [organophosphates] had been used during their pregnancy. . .” As reported in Daily News, significant disparities are found for elevated exposure to pesticides, “with Hispanic/Latinx, young people, and residents of the predominantly fruit and vegetable growing Central Coast region being most likely to live near OP pesticide applications during pregnancy.”
U.S. Representative Nydia Velázquez (D-NY), who is retiring from Congress at the end of the current Congress, reintroduced the “Ban All Neurotoxic Organophosphate Pesticides from Our Food Act” or ''BAN OPs From Our Food Act,” H.R. 5554, in 2023. “We've known for decades that organophosphate pesticides are a dangerous neurological threat to farmworkers and our children,” said Congresswoman Velázquez. “These pesticides during early life have been linked to irreversible harm to the developing brain, which can result in long-term effects like attention disorders, autism, and reduced IQ. We can no longer wait to act. I'm proud to have introduced this legislation which will finally ban the use of these hazardous pesticides.” The bill is very straightforward, free of exemptions, waivers, and special circumstances, and allows formulations:
“SEC. 2. PROHIBITION ON USE OF ORGANOPHOSPHATES ON FOOD. Section 402 of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (21 U.S.C. 342) is amended by adding at the end the following: ''(j) If it bears or contains any organophosphate pesticide, including any residue of an organophosphate pesticide, or any other added substance the presence of which is primarily as a result of the metabolism or other degradation of an organophosphate pesticide, regardless of whether any tolerance or exemption with respect to organophosphate is in effect under section 408.''
The bill has been supported by Beyond Pesticides and groups including Earthjustice and United Farm Workers, UFW Foundation, California Rural Legal Assistance (CRLA) Foundation, Alianza Nacional de Campesinas, Farmworker Association of Florida, Farmworker Justice, GreenLatinos, Labor Council for Latin American Advancement, League of United Latin American Citizens, Learning Disabilities Association of America, Natural Resources Defense Council, Pesticide Action Network North America, and Pineros y Campesinos Unidos del Noroeste.
