Good news on pesticide spraying
UPHE has been sounding the alarm on pesticide spraying for years. These toxic chemicals, aggressively marketed by agrochemical giants, permeate our daily lives, exposing us to a host of serious health risks. From immediate symptoms like nausea and dizziness to long-term consequences, including cancer, reproductive issues, and developmental disorders, the dangers of pesticide exposure are both extensive and alarming.
Well, we finally have a bit of good news from the courts, who stopped a federal group from spraying insecticide on millions of acres in 17 western states. The lawsuit was brought by our friends at the Center for Biological Diversity. The court found the group failed to consider other preventative strategies, a significant ruling against the controversial “spray-first” policy that many governmental agencies have been using for years.
Courthouse News Service reported on the judge’s decision, “There is no evidence that focusing on pesticide treatments fulfills the overall purpose of the relevant statutes,” the judge said. “Nor is there evidence that [integrated pest management] techniques were just given less attention than the use of pesticides … Instead, the EIS appears to foreclose consideration of any non-suppression methods of managing the grasshopper population.”
Utah and Salt Lake County have been promoting their own “spray-first” policy related to mosquito pesticide spraying.
“Pesticides dominate the list of chemical villains, their overuse has left our air, water, food and soil widely contaminated. They have infiltrated the blood, tissue and organs of almost every person on the planet. An exposure to a pregnant mother exposes her baby as well because pesticides pass through the placenta and enter the fetal circulation. We should all be repulsed that on day one they are already contaminating newborns and their mother’s breast milk,” UPHE’s Dr. Brian Moench wrote years ago in an op-ed opposing the Salt Lake City Mosquito Abatement District’s proposal to use Air Force helicopters to spray chemicals.
This pause by the court on pesticides is an encouraging indication that the toxicity of pesticides is beginning to be recognized and other, non-toxic, options will be prioritized.
More on pesticides ↓↓↓