EPA Scientists/ Gov Employees Union Tell EPA DON'T EXPOSE KIDS TO PESTICIDE EXPE

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[sSRI-Research] EPA Scientists/ Gov Employees Union Tell EPA

DON'T EXPOSE KIDS TO PESTICIDE EXPE

 

 

 

 

 

 

ALLIANCE FOR HUMAN RESEARCH PROTECTION (AHRP)

Promoting Openness, Full Disclosure, and Accountability

http://www.ahrp.org/cms/

 

FYI / Action

 

Once again, EPA administrators are colluding with the pesticide

industry in

an effort to overthrow the Food Quality Protection Act, a 10-year old

law

enacted for the protection of children from pesticides--pooisons

designed to

kill.

 

In a letter to Stephen Johnson, EPA Adminsitrator, nine unions

representing 9,000 EPA scientists, risk managers and others warn that

the

agency " " has lost sight of its regulatory responsibilities in trying

to

reach consensus with those that it regulates, and the result is that

the

integrity of the science upon which Agency decisions are based has

been

compromised. "

 

The Oregonian reports the empoloyees asked that decisions be made

free of

" outside political influences. " They asked Johnson to weigh

cumulative risks

to all children through the food they eat and to cancel or restrict

pesticide uses that might be harmful to the children of farmworkers. "

 

Raise your voice to your congressional reps against the use of

children as

laboratory rats in experiments that violate the principles of the

Nuremberg

Code which define permissible human experiments.

 

 

 

Contact: Vera Hassner Sharav

212-595-8974

veracare

 

 

http://www.oregonlive.com/printer/printer.ssf?/base/business/114861212

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The Oregonian

EPA workers blast agency's rulings

Pesticides - Employees are worried that decisions due this summer on

20

products may face outside pressures

Friday, May 26, 2006

ALEX PULASKI

 

By pandering to farmers and chemical manufacturers, the Environmental

Protection Agency risks gutting a 10-year-old law designed to

safeguard

children from dangerous pesticides, workers within the agency charge.

 

In a letter sent this week to agency Administrator Stephen L.

Johnson, nine

representatives of unions representing about 9,000 EPA scientists,

risk

managers and other workers said the agency " has lost sight of its

regulatory

responsibilities in trying to reach consensus with those that it

regulates,

and the result is that the integrity of the science upon which Agency

decisions are based has been compromised. "

 

Since 1996, the Food Quality Protection Act has been under attack

from both

sides -- pesticide makers and farmers asserting that the law is being

applied too stringently, and environmentalists and consumer advocates

charging that it is being undermined. The law was intended to protect

children from hazardous effects of pesticides in foods and in the

environment.

 

The letter sent Wednesday represents the second time in recent months

that

workers within the agency have openly questioned whether their chief

is

putting children at risk by bowing to industry pressures.

 

" Our colleagues in the Pesticide Program feel besieged by political

pressure

exerted by Agency officials perceived to be too closely aligned with

the

pesticide industry and former EPA officials now representing the

pesticide

and agricultural community . . . " the letter states.

 

" Equally alarming is the belief among managers in the Pesticide and

Toxics

Programs that regulatory decisions should only be made after reaching

full

consensus with the regulated pesticide and chemicals industry. "

 

In response, the agency issued a one-paragraph written statement from

spokeswoman Jennifer Wood.

 

" EPA has been reviewing all pesticides in question and applying new,

stricter standards as required under the Food Quality Protection Act,

with a

specific focus on their effects on children's health, " she said. " EPA

remains committed to its mission of protecting human health and the

environment. "

 

In a letter sent to Johnson in December, the American Federation of

Government Employees, a union with members who work for the EPA, said

the

agency's proposed rules on accepting data from trials exposing humans

to

pesticides -- instead of typical animal studies -- had so many

loopholes

that they invite unethical behavior such as intentionally dosing

children

and pregnant women.

 

Representatives of the government employees union, National Treasury

Employees Union, and Engineers and Scientists of California joined in

asking

Johnson in the letter this week to ensure that decisions due this

summer on

more than 20 pesticides are made free of " outside political

influences. "

They asked Johnson to weigh cumulative risks to all children through

the

food they eat and to cancel or restrict pesticide uses that might be

harmful

to the children of farmworkers.

 

Under the act, advocates on both sides have repeatedly argued that

science

is in their favor. But a huge hurdle in trying to determine which

pesticides

can be safely used and the potential neurological risks to children

in the

foods they consume is that much of the science is based on how

animals, not

humans, react to chemical exposures.

 

Because of uncertainties between how humans and lab rats react, EPA

scientists have tended to add safety factors -- reducing by as much

as 1,000

times the allowable pesticide residues children can be exposed to in

the

food they eat. While the method sounds abstract, the result of such

limitations is that particular pesticides -- and even whole classes

of them

-- face strict limits or extinction.

 

For example, the EPA in recent years has banned methyl parathion and

severely restricted chlorpyrifos, which had been the most commonly

used

insecticide in the United States. The agency also limited uses of

azinphos-methyl, a bug-killer widely sprayed on tree fruits in Oregon

and

Washington.

 

With the EPA facing an August deadline to reassess human tolerances

for

pesticides in food and the environment, the union representatives

wrote that

it would be " a perversion of the constitutional process and betrayal

of the

public trust for the agency to fail to adhere to the mandates of the

(Food

Quality Protection Act). "

 

Dave Christenson, a Denver-based union official who signed the

letter, said

employees take seriously their oath to uphold the Constitution, and

that

publicly pressuring the agency head to do as much is " not something

we do

every day, but we're finding ourselves doing it more and more. "

 

Alex Pulaski, 503-221-8516; alexpulaski

 

 

C2006 The Oregonian

 

 

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