Require Public Warnings for Dangerous Pesticides
- al: Susan V
- destinatario: US Congress
Beyond Pesticides reports that a 10-year old Florida boy suffered brain damage after his home was fumigated with sulfuryl fluoride. The pesticides alternative advocates allege that his parents were not properly pre-warned of the severe neurotoxic effects of this chemical.
According to the report, shortly after returning home -- having been reassured it was safe to do so -- the entire family became ill. While other members recovered, the boy continued to suffer from “uncontrollable muscle movements” and could neither stand nor speak. He remained in a Miami hospital “weeks after the initial exposure took place,” adds Beyond Pesticides.
Cornell University’s Extoxnet describes Sulfuryl fluoride as “a toxic gas which acts as a central nervous system depressant. Symptoms of poisoning include depression, slowed gait, slurred speech, nausea, vomiting, stomach pain, drunkenness, itching, numbness, twitching, and seizures. Inhalation may be fatal due to respiratory failure.”
Worse, Sulfuryl fluoride is also odorless and lacks other properties that would warn people of its presence.
For this reason every one who occupies, visits or works in buildings treated with this and other volatile toxic pesticides should be given copies of material safety data sheets and adequately warned before entering a treated building of a pesticide’s potential for harm. Schools, employers and homeowners should also be told about safer alterntives.
Tell Congress to make public pesticide warnings and notice of alternative options mandatory.
We, the undersigned, say people exposed to pesticides should be made fully aware of the risks of those exposures and alternative options - before they are exposed.
According to Beyond Pesticides, “There are many viable alternatives to sulfuryl fluoride…including temperature manipulation (heating and cooling), atmospheric controls (low oxygen and fumigation with carbon dioxide), biological controls (pheromones, viruses and nematodes), and less toxic chemical controls (diatomaceous earth).
Beyond Pesticides’ has for many years recommended the use of least-toxic pest control and provides fact sheets and other information to help home and business owners, schools and municipalities help protect occupants and visitors from the kind of toxic exposures that are affecting many - some whose symptoms may never be properly traced to their cause.
Furthermore material safety data sheets, outlining some of the hazards associated with toxic ingredients in pesticides, are required for every pesticide on the market. These should be made available to all homeowners who are considering having homes treated with pesticides and posted on doors of all buildings treated with volatile pesticides, prior to and after treatment. Parents should also be warned that current info on pesticide hazards often does not include special vulnerability of children to these exposures. Children and even certain adults do not have the capability to metabolize particular poisons.
Brain damage to just one 10-year old boy should be enough to prompt Congress to take serious preventive measures. But, in fact, many have been victims of pesticide exposures. Beyond Pesticide says Nebraska Institute of Agriculture and Natural Resources reports “that In 2010 alone, poison control centers in the U.S.” received “ 91,940 calls related to pesticide exposures….” Another highly publicized case, where two children were seriously injured after pesticide treatment at their vacation condo in St. John, has reportedly left these children in critical condition and the parents possibly permanently paralyzed.
We insist that Congress mandate that all applicators provide adequate public warnings and alternative options to toxic volatile pesticides.
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