Módulo profesional: empresa e iniciativa emprendedora

Many health professionals believe the danger from pesticide residues to be mini- mal, and much less of a concern than other food safety problems such as microbial contamination of foods, environmental contaminants, and naturally occurring tox- ins (Winter 1996). They point out that a diet rich in fruits and vegetables is associ- ated with a reduced risk of chronic disease, including many cancers. The benefits from eating fruits and vegetables significantly outweigh the theoretical risks posed by pesticide residues.

Human data on the cancer-causing properties of pesticides come from studies showing that farmers and others who use and apply pesticides have an increased rate of certain cancers. Studies have not shown a cause and effect relationship between

dietary exposure to pesticides and cancer. However, showing such a relationship

would be very difficult because exposure occurs over decades and how cancer devel- ops is not well understood. Pesticide-related deaths have been caused by accidents or misuse where workers are exposed due to improper or inadequate care in handling and use, such as not wearing protective clothing or masks. A large proportion of deaths attributed to pesticides are accidental poisonings of children.

EPA tolerances are established for raw foods. However, most pesticides break down with exposure to sunlight, rain, and other elements, so that they are usually below tol-

59

erance levels even before leaving the farm. Processing methods such as washing, can- ning, freezing, pasteurizing, and cooking further decrease the amount of pesticide residues in foods as eaten. Surveys of actual dietary exposure in the United States have demonstrated that typical intake averaged less than 1 percent of the Reference Dose, in itself a very conservative measure of safety (Ritter 1997). The majority of illegal resi- dues are considered illegal because they are not registered for the product on which they are found, although they are registered on other commodities. Exposure to these illegal residues does not necessarily represent any toxicologic danger.

The general public, most of whom are poorly qualified to determine risks, is easily swayed by media hype and the story of the day. Risk perception is often based on emo- tions, rather than science. Pesticides are a sensitive issue because we perceive the risks as out of our control. The risk is involuntary versus voluntary. People think nothing of driving a car out onto a busy highway and the risk it involves, yet are concerned about the risk of pesticide residues in their food. A study conducted in the late 1980s high- lights the wide gulf between perceived risks and established risks. Three groups, col- lege students, League of Women Voters, and business people, were asked to rate various risks on a scale from 1 to 30, with 1 being the highest and 30 the lowest. Col- lege students ranked pesticides at a risk level of 4, women voters ranked them at 9, and business people at 15. But placement of the risk from pesticides based on factual mor- tality data resulted in a risk level of 28, lower than motor vehicles, swimming, bicycles, home appliances, power lawn mowers, and skiing. It is estimated that approximately 30 people die each year from pesticides, mostly children from accidental poisonings. In comparison, about 50,000 people die annually in motor vehicle accidents, 3,000 die while swimming, and 1,000 die in bicycle accidents. Yet people perceive that they have a choice and at least some control over the outcome in these other risks, whereas they have no control over the presence, amount, or type of pesticides in their food.

Those involved in the crusade against pesticides argue that the risks from pesticide residues on foods are more than merely theoretical. EPA’s Non-Occupational Pesti- cide Exposure Study (NOPES) examined 32 pesticides and pesticide residues and found that the route of most exposure for the general population was via dietary ex- posure. A small amount of this was due to pesticide residues in drinking water, and an even smaller amount from inhalation or other pathways, but most was from dietary exposure via foods. Many of the older pesticides still in use were approved before more stringent controls and better laboratory methods were put in place. In its re- port, Overexposed: Organophosphate Insectides in Children’s Food, the Environmental Working Group (EWG) claims that every day, one million American children age five and under consume unsafe levels of organophosphate pesticides that can harm the developing brain and nervous system (Wiles 1998). In addition, EWG criticizes FDA for shortcomings in its pesticide monitoring program, proposing that U.S.-grown produce is more than twice as contaminated with illegal pesticides than the FDA reports (Elderkin 1995).

The big unknown factor with chemicals, including pesticides, is that not a lot is known about their long-term effects on the human body. Scientists can only conduct long-term studies in animal models; little research exists on long-term effects of pes- ticides accumulated in humans. The medical community does not fully understand how and why cancer develops, but carcinogens appear to be cumulative, and pesti- cides probably impair the immune system over a lifetime.

Some scientists argue that EPA’s pesticide residue tolerances do not represent safe levels. Tolerances are established as enforcement tools for monitoring to ensure that

60

pesticides are used according to regulations. The enforced tolerances are not based on human health risk, and so these maximum residue levels have very little to do with safety. Because of this, it is difficult to determine whether illegal residues are unsafe, or, conversely, whether residue levels below the tolerances are safe (Winter 1992; Groth 1999). After analyzing USDA data, Consumers Union scientists determined that safety margins established by EPA are not adequate to protect children from the harmful effects of pesticides (Groth 1999).

Critics of the EPA’s efforts to regulate pesticides point to the system for approv- ing pesticide registrations as rife with fraud and manipulated by pesticide manufac- turers. The tests that EPA relies on to determine tolerances and reference doses are designed and conducted by manufacturers or by laboratories that they have hired. Twice, in the mid-1970s and again in the early 1990s, major testing labs were found to have faked vital safety tests on pesticides. Congress does not fund EPA with suffi- cient resources to carry out its own research, which forces EPA to rely on data from manufacturers. With 70,000 chemicals in commerce and hundreds under active re- view at any given time, it isn’t realistic to expect that the EPA can take over the job of testing all of them for safety.

Many consumer and health advocates claim that chemical companies subtly slant scientific research as part of their campaigns to keep dangerous products on the mar- ket. Looking at the source of a study’s funding can be an accurate means of predict- ing its results. Critics claim that when chemical companies finance studies, the results tend to show that the chemicals are not dangerous to human health or the environ- ment. But when independent scientists from governments, universities, and medical and charitable organizations conduct studies, they tend to show the chemicals in an unfavorable light. When manufacturers don’t like the results of their own studies, they have sometimes withheld them from EPA. In 1991 and 1992 EPA offered am- nesty to manufacturers who turned in unpublished studies that should have been submitted earlier. Chemical companies suddenly produced more than 10,000 stud- ies showing that products from all classes of chemicals (not just pesticides) already on the market could pose “substantial risk of injury to health or to the environment.” These are the kinds of never-published data that the law says must be presented to the government immediately (Fagin 1999).

Finally, critics point to the revolving door phenomenon. An analysis by EWG on the employment of former top EPA pesticide regulators after they left the agency revealed that two-thirds of the highest ranking officials since the pesticide program was estab- lished had received at least part of their paycheck from pesticide interests. This includes four out of six former assistant administrators for Pesticides and Toxic Substances, and two out of four former directors of the Office of Pesticide Programs. An additional dozen former EPA staffers who occupied positions important to the evaluation of pesti- cide moved to private-sector careers representing pesticide interests (Headen 1999). Fagin and Lavelle estimate that nearly half of EPA officials who leave top-level jobs in toxic substances and pesticides go to work for chemical companies, chemical trade asso- ciations, or as lobbyists for the chemical industry (Fagin 1999).

SOURCES

Bohmont, Bert L. 1997. The Standard Pesticide User’s Guide. 4th ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall, Inc.

61

Elderkin, Susan, Richard Wiles, and Christopher Campbell. 1995. Forbidden Fruit: Illegal

Pesticides in the U.S. Food Supply. Washington: Environmental Working Group.

http://www.ewg.org/pub/home/reports/Fruit/forbid_short.html.

Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Updated April 12, 2000. The Food Quality Protec-

tion Act (FQPA) Background. Washington: Environmental Protection Agency.

http://www.epa.gov/oppfead1/fqpa/backgrnd.htm.

Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Updated January 20, 2000. Pesticide Registra-

tion. Washington: Environmental Protection Agency. http://www.epa.gov/

pesticides/citizens/registration.htm.

Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). November 17, 1999. Protecting the Public from

Pesticide Residues in Food. Washington: Environmental Protection Agency.

http://www.epa.gov/opp00001/citizens/protect.htm.

Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). January 1999. Assessing Health Risks from Pesti-

cides. Washington: Environmental Protection Agency. http://www.epa.gov/

pesticides/citizens/riskassess.htm.

Fagin, Dan, and Marianne Lavelleby.1999. Toxic Deception: How the Chemical Industry Ma-

nipulates Science, Bends the Law, and Endangers Your Health. Monroe, ME: Com-

mon Courage Press.

Food Marketing Institute (FMI). February 1999. Backgrounder: Pesticides in the Food Sup-

ply. Washington: Food Marketing Institute. http://www.fmi.org/media/bg/

pests.html.

Groth, Edward, III, Charles M. Benbrook, and Karen Lutz. 1999. Do You Know

What You Are Eating? New York: Consumers Union. http:// www.ecologic-ipm.

com/Do_You_Know.pdf.

Headen, Emily. 1999. From Bureaucrats to Fat Cats: EPA Pesticide Program Is a “Farm

Team” for the Pesticide Lobby. Washington: Environmental Working Group.

http://www.ewg.org/pub/home/reports/fatcats/fatcats.html.

International Food Information Council (IFIC). January 1995. IFIC Review: On Pesticides

and Food Safety. Washington: International Food Information Council.

http://ificinfo.health.org/review/ir-pest.htm.

National Research Council (NRC) Committee on Pesticides in the Diets of Infants and Children. 1993. Pesticides in the Diets of Infants and Children. Washington: Na- tional Academy Press.

Ritter, Len. 1997. Ad Hoc Panel on Pesticides and Cancer, Canadian Network of Toxicology Centres, Guelph, Ontario, Canada. Cancer 80: 1887–1888. http://www.pmac.net/ canadian.htm.

United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), Agricultural Marketing Service. 1998.

Pesticide Data Program Annual Summary 1998. Washington: United States

Department of Agriculture. http://www.ams.usda.gov/science/pdp/. U.S. Food and Drug Administration. March 1999. Residue Monitoring 1998. Washington:

U.S. Food and Drug Administration. http:// vm.cfsan.fda.gov/~dms/ pes98rep.html.

Wiles, Richard, Kert Davies, and Christopher Campbell. 1998. Overexposed:

Organophosphate Insectides in Children’s Food. Washington: Environmental

Working Group. http://www.ewg.org/pub/home/reports/ops/oppress.html. Winter, Carl K. 1996. Pesticide Residues in Foods: Recent Events and Emerging Issues.

Weed Technology. 10: 969–973.

Winter, Carl K. 1992. Pesticide Tolerances Are Their Relevance as Safety Standards. Regu-

latory Toxicology and Pharmacology. 15: 137–150.

62