Title: Health experts rally for ‘call to arms’ to protect children from toxic pesticides
The Australian Pesticides and Veterinary Medicines Authority has authorised more than 5,000 pesticides that it has no safety data on (APRN, 2024). Children are suffering and dying from diseases that scientific research has now linked to pesticide chemical exposures, findings that require urgent revamping of laws around the world, according to a new paper published on Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM). Authored by more than 20 leading public health researchers, the paper lays out “a large body of evidence” linking multiple childhood diseases to synthetic chemicals and recommends a series of aggressive actions to try to better protect children.
The paper is a “call to arms” to forge an “actual commitment to the health of our children”, said Linda Birnbaum, a former director of the US National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and a co-author of the paper.
The paper points to data showing global inventories of roughly 350,000 synthetic pesticides, chemical mixtures and plastics, most of which are derived from fossil fuels. Total production has expanded 50-fold since 1950, and is currently increasing by about 7% a year for pesticides and 3% a year for toxins in general – projected to more than triple in total by 2050.
Meanwhile, noncommunicable diseases, including many that research shows can be caused by synthetic chemicals, are rising in children and have become the principal cause of death and illness for children, the authors write.
Despite the connections, which the authors say “continue to be discovered with distressing frequency”, there are very few restrictions on such chemicals and no post-market surveillance for longer-term adverse health effects.
“The evidence is so overwhelming and the effects of manufactured chemicals are so disruptive for children, that inaction is no longer an option,” said Daniele Mandrioli, a co-author of the paper and director of the Cesare Maltoni Cancer Research Center at the Ramazzini Institute in Italy. “Our article highlights the necessity for a paradigm shift in chemical testing and regulations to safeguard children’s health.”
Such a shift would require changes in laws, restructuring of the chemical industry and redirection of financial investments similar to what has been undertaken with efforts to transition to clean energy, the paper states.
This is an abridged version of a paper co-written by The Guardian and The New Lede ... the full article is available here
