Illness
rise linked to pesticides at schools
Wednesday, July 27, 2005 • BY
LINDSEY TANNER • Associated
Press
CHICAGO -- Pesticide use in or near U.S.
schools sickened more than 2,500 children and school
employees over a five-year period, and though most illnesses
were mild, their numbers have increased, a nationwide report
found.
Sources include chemicals to kill insects
and weeds on school grounds, disinfectants and farming
pesticides that drift over nearby schools, according to the
report by researchers at the National Institute for
Occupational Safety and Health and their
colleagues.
Lead author Walter Alarcon said one of
the largest recent incidents occurred in May when about 600
students and staff members were evacuated from an Edinburg,
Texas, elementary school after pesticides sprayed on a
cotton field drifted into the school's air-conditioning
system. About 30 students and nine staffers developed mild
symptoms including nausea and headaches.
The study, which appears in today's
Journal of the American Medical Association, covered events
from 1998 to 2002 -- none as big as the Texas incident,
Alarcon said.
Activists seeking to reduce pesticide use
contend many commonly used pesticides, including some
involved in the study incidents, can increase risks for
cancer, birth defects and nerve damage.
"The chronic long-term impacts of
pesticide exposures have not been comprehensively evaluated;
therefore, the potential for chronic health effects from
pesticide exposures at schools should not be dismissed," the
authors wrote.
Still, the overall rate of pesticide
illnesses in schools is small -- 7.4 cases per million
children and 27.3 cases per million school employees, the
authors said.
Jay Vroom, president of CropLife America,
which represents suppliers of farming pesticides, said the
report is alarmist and that pesticide use around schools "is
well-regulated and can be managed to a level that does not
present an unreasonable health risk."
Allen James, president of RISE, a trade
group for makers of pesticides used in schools, faulted the
study for relying on unverified reports and said the numbers
nonetheless suggest that incidents are "extremely
rare."
The authors tallied reports from three
pesticide surveillance systems, including a national
database of calls to poison control centers and found that
2,593 students and school employees developed
pesticide-related illnesses in the five years studied. Only
three illnesses were considered severe.
Most of the illnesses were in children.
The number of children affected each year climbed from 59 to
104 among preschoolers and from 225 to 333 among children
ages 6 to 17.
"I don't think we want to overwhelm
people, but the study does provide evidence that using
pesticides at schools is not innocuous and that there are
better ways to use pesticides," said study co-author
Geoffrey Calvert.
Claire Barnett of the Healthy Schools
Network advocacy group said the total is likely a "deep
undercount" because there are about 54 million U.S.
schoolchildren and yet no comprehensive national tracking
system.
The authors said the study underscores
the need to reduce pesticide use through pest management
programs that typically require schools to use pesticides as
a last resort and to implement advance written notification
when the chemicals are used. The guidelines also often
recommend that spraying in schools or in nearby fields
should occur only when students and staffers are not
present.
© 2005 The Star-Ledger. Used by NJ.com with
permission.
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