Pesticide Exposure Linked to Brain Activity Differences in Adolescents
UPHE is dedicated to bringing the latest science into the debate over public policy. The latest science is very clear: we must stop contaminating our environment with toxic chemicals, especially pesticides. SLCMAD insists that spraying an organophosphate pesticide all over the Northwest Quadrant of SLC is safe. But the latest science clearly says otherwise.
“A group of California teenagers exposed to common agricultural pesticides before birth had distinctive reductions in certain types of brain activity, according to a new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
“The study, which is the first to link differences in adolescents’ brain activity to their level of prenatal pesticide exposure, adds to a large body of research about the health effects of organophosphate pesticides. Organophosphates are a group of insecticides sprayed on many fruit and vegetable crops [and against mosquitoes]. Because of toxicity concerns, the federal Environmental Protection Agency banned indoor and residential uses of these pesticides in 2000, and in May, the California EPA prohibited all uses of one organophosphate compound, chlorpyrifos.”
In Utah, a state with one of the highest rates of autism in the country, one in every 32 boys is now being diagnosed with autism. We cannot ignore the overwhelming evidence that environmental neurotoxins like pesticides contribute to this alarming trend.