Pesticide Action Network (PANNA) offers a customizable petition to speak out against one of the worst pesticides around. Abundant evidence of the harm to children has been around for decades, yet it has not been banned, despite the EPA's own recommendations before the election. I and both my children were acutely ill from exposure, and my daughter went straight from acute symptoms of exposure to leukemia. If only a generation previous had banned it, as they should have, she would have been twenty-three years old right now.
In the comments box, I mentioned Katherine, and all the other children who are affected by childhood cancer, autism, ADHD, and lowered IQs. Bouchard and others showed in 2011 that the children with the top fifth highest levels of chlorpyrifos in their blood were seven IQ points lower than those in the bottom fifth, and that's not zero. This is one study showing one effect on children, but there are hundreds if not thousands of others. You can read more on my blogs here or here.
Visit Panna at http://www.panna.org/take-action/epa-follow-science-chlorpyrifos to make your comments.
EPA, follow the science on chlorpyrifos
14,002 Signatures Collected
Only 11,598 more until our goal of 25,600
Sign This Petition at
http://www.panna.org/take-action/follow-science-chlorpyrifos-epa?source=direct_link&
To: Scott Pruitt, EPA Administrator
From: Jean-Marie Kauth
Dear Administrator Pruitt,
The sudden reversal of your agency’s plans to get chlorpyrifos off the market was shameful. The March 29 decision cannot stand. All chlorpyrifos uses must be banned to protect children, workers and consumers from this brain-harming chemical.
The science is in: There are no safe uses of chlorpyrifos. Prenatal exposures to this chemical are associated with reduced IQ, loss of working memory, attention disorders and delayed motor development. Whenever chlorpyrifos is sprayed, it can cause immediate and long-term health harms to kids, farmers, farmworkers and others who are exposed.
In its latest risk assessment of chlorpyrifos, your agency’s scientists determined that:
* All food exposures exceed safe levels, with children ages 1-2 exposed to levels of chlorpyrifos that are 140 times what the EPA deems safe.
* There is no safe level of chlorpyrifos in drinking water.
* Chlorpyrifos is found at unsafe levels in the air at schools and homes in communities in agricultural areas.
* All workers who mix and apply chlorpyrifos are exposed to unsafe levels of the pesticide, even with maximum personal protective equipment and engineering controls.
Action on this neurotoxic chemical is long overdue. We insist that you follow your own scientists’ recommendations and take action to ban chlorpyrifos.
