Three New Reports Reveal Children's Chemical Exposure

Evidence Continues to Mount for School Pesticide Reform

U.S. EPA released their second edition of America’s Children and the Environment: Measures of Contaminants, Body Burdens, and Illnesses (www.epa.gov/envirohealth/chiidren) in February. Included in the report are the results of a Minnesota study of pesticides in schools, which found that some pesticides have been detected at indoor concentrations potentially hazardous to children weeks and months after application.

Forty percent of the responding custodians reported that their schools provided no notification of pesticide use such as notices in fumigated areas or pre- and post-application letters to students and teachers.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) released the second National Report on Human Exposure to Environmental Chemicals (www.cdc.gov/exposurereport), which measured blood and urine samples for 116 chemicals that found their way into the human population through pollution or consumer products.

The report found positive results for 89 chemicals in the volunteers tested, including selected organophosphate pesticides, herbicides, pest repellents and disinfectants. The Environmental Working Group (EWG), in partnership with Mt. Sinai School of Community Medicine and Commonweal released a similar study, Body Burden: The Pollution In People (www.ewg.org/reports/ bodyburden/mdex.php). Published in the peer-reviewed journal Public Health Reports, the study offers an up-close and personal look at nine individuals whose bodies were tested for 210 chemicals. Subjects contained an average of 91 compounds, most of which did not exist 75 years ago.

School Pesticide Monitor is published by Beyond Pesticides and is a free service to those interested in school pesticide issues.
Editors: Meghan Taylor and Kagan Owens.  If you are interested in receiving the
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