Throughout the eight years of the Bush Administration, NRDC and others have documented the science under siege at the EPA, to expose the cozy relationship between the regulatory agency and the industries it is tasked with regulating. Not content to simply undermine health standards for a host of toxic chemicals one-by-one, Administration officials have also attacked the foundational process for assessing the risks of toxic chemicals, the EPA Integrated Risk Information System (IRIS) program that assesses hazardous substances.
Yesterday, two letters were sent to EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson, one from environmental and health groups, and another from toxicologists relaying concerns with the White House imposed changes to the EPA IRIS chemical evaluation process.
The importance of having timely, robust, reliable chemical assessments on the IRIS database was evident in the testimony today of Mr. Daniel Parshley of the Glynn Environmental Coalition in Georgia. The Office of the Inspector General (OIG), at the request the Glynn Environmental Coalition, has reviewed claims that a Glynn County, GA Superfund site contaminated with Toxaphene, a toxic persistant legacy chemical that was banned in 1990 in the U.S., is receiving inadequate clean up. At the heart of the dispute is a testing method that fails to detect most of the toxic congeners and degradation products of toxaphene, thus underestimating the extent of contamination. Use of the biased testing method was approved by a closed partnership between EPA Region 4, the Georgia Environmental Protection Division (GaEPD) and Hercules, Inc. that failed to include community representatives. Both the OIG and a previous review by the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (2002), have recommended that EPA should discard this flawed method in favor of established tests that identify toxaphene degradation products. Mr. Parshley came all the way to Washington to ask Congress to help his community get justice. They want clean up, so their children won't have to live and go to school near a toxic dump site.
NRDC is asking Congress to defend our public servant scientists as the Nation's brain-trust, and to require IRIS health assessments to be reviewed in an open process, without inappropriate political interference. It is the least that Mr. Parshley's community and others like his across the country deserve!
]]>To my delight, GoozNews.com has just dumped its weekly newsletter into my inbox. Yay! This week is especially intriguiging, with an excellent interview with a bioterrorism expert on the investigative bungling of the anthrax-guy-that-probably-did-it-and-may-have-acted-alone-but-we-will-never-know. The main point is that by diverting funding from medical research to terrorism research we have increased the numbers of lab staff with access to deadly biological materials, failed to employ any additional safety measures on these researchers, and diverted funding away from medical research that would actually save lives.
We interrupt this previously scheduled post for an important announcement: NRDC bloggers are participating during the upcoming week in the inaugural NRDC Bulwer-Lytton © Environmental Blogging Competition to select the worst opening sentence of a post on Switchboard. The competition follows the deliciously dreadful example of the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, a literary parody contest that San Jose State University sponsors each year. This year’s awesomely awful winner in the actual contest can be read here.
NRDC’s competition will follow the same model, with the difference being that the opening sentence of a Switchboard post must address an environmental or energy or public health topic that an NRDC blogger otherwise would cover. Plus, the blogger must go on to complete a post that otherwise would stand on its own on Switchboard.
The competition will run for a week, starting today, and the winner will be announced at the end of the week after next, following voting by Switchboard’s bloggers. Switchboard readers are encouraged to cast their votes by commenting on individual posts, and those votes will be factored heavily into the final tally.
Let the contest begin!
I'd encourage you to sign up for the GoozNews, grab a cup of enjoyment and dig in to the latest misdeeds of corporate America!
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The letter was issued by myself and Dr. Celeste Monforton of George Washington University and the Project on Scientific Knowledge and Public Policy (SKAPP), and supported with signatures from prominent industrial hygienists, physicians, epidemiologists, toxicologists, and other practitioners involved in workers’ safety and health research and prevention programs. The letter asked that the DOL proposal be withdrawn.
As detailed on the SKAPP website, the DOL proposed rule fails to provide any validated guidance that would improve the current risk assessment methods, and has numerous serious flaws that would weaken current approaches and undermine occupational health rules. It would also add an additional step to the rulemaking process further delaying the development and issuance of needed protections.
DOL's proposed rule must be seen as part of a larger thinly-veiled effort by the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to alter risk assessment methods by stealth across the regulatory agencies, after a bolder comprehensive overhaul met with strong agency resistance and finally complete rejection by a committee of experts convened by the National Academies. That expert committee issued its report in January 2007, concluding “that the OMB bulletin is fundamentally flawed” and recommending that, “it be withdrawn.”
Nonetheless, many of the flawed OMB recommendations have re-emerged in this DOL proposal.
Earlier this year NRDC led an effort to prevent similar attacks made under the guise of risk assessment improvements to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Integrated Risk Information System (IRIS) database. The IRIS database contains expert consensus evaluations of potential human health effects from exposure to more than 540 chemicals, including highly hazardous chemicals such as vinyl chloride, butadiene, benzene, lead, mercury, and asbestos
As NRDC testified in Congressional hearings earlier this summer, the new 2008 IRIS process introduces three new opportunities for the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and other non-health agencies to weigh in on EPA’s health assessments, where previously there was only one. Importantly, interagency comments and OMB comments for all three of the new intervention points are shielded from public view.
The White House OMB proposed changes to risk assessment methods are part of a much broader agenda by the Bush Administration to weaken health protections for workers, the public, and the environment.
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Phthalates make plastics flexible, like infant products and children's toys, packaging, flexible tubing, and some adhesives. NRDC even found them in air fresheners. The government even found them in our bodies!
Although most types of phthalates are not well studied, we do know that in male rodents exposed before or soon after birth to some kinds of phthalates, many rodent pups showed a variety of developmental and reproductive abnormalities, including undescended testes, feminized reproductive organs, and hypospadias (failure of the penis to form a fully closed tube). Eeewwww! More information is available here and here.
Maybe that is why House and Senate conferees this week agreed to a Bill that contained a provision to ban some types of phthalates from children's toys, effective six months from now. Yay Congress! The bill is not perfect, but it is a step in the right direction. Although the House and Senate still have to vote on the bill, if passed, it would ban three types of phthalates from children's toys, including DEHP, and temporarily outlaw three others until their health effects are better studied in children and pregnant women. This precautionary move is a welcomed sign of progress since toxic chemicals are usually presumed innocent by regulators until evidence of harm is overwhelming and undeniable.
Way to follow behind those trend-setters, Wal-Mart and Toys R Us, that told their suppliers earlier this year to get phthalates out of the kiddie toys.
The Congressional ban was strongly opposed by Exxon Mobil that, according to the Washington Post, "...spent a chunk of its $22 million lobbying budget in the past 18 months to try to prevent any ban."
Public Citizen, Consumers Union and others did an analysis of CPSC recalls in 2008 and found that in the first six months, "...108 children’s products were recalled, including 45 for lead contamination and 10 for hazardous magnets. Of those 108 products, fifty-three toys have been recalled this year already, totaling 6.2 million units." These recall measures represent a failure to protect the public from hazards in consumer products until millions of toxic toys are already in our children’s bedrooms, playrooms, daycares, and cribs.
Our legal team had requested the documents from CPSC under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), which obligates all federal agencies to disclose communications (letters, emails, meeting notes, etc.) with outside parties, i.e. the industry. We made our request in April, 2007; it has been over a year and we have received absolutely nothing, despite legal requirements for CPSC to respond within 20 days.
Not taking 'no' for an answer, we took legal action. The public has a legal right to know about the CPSC's communications with Exxon and other manufacturers of these phthalates, and the oil an chemical industries have a duty to tell the public which products might be exposing them to these dangerous chemicals.
This blog will keep you posted as our legal and scientific team sort through the documents we expect to receive!
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EPA found in their review of the pesticide that the acute dietary risk from food alone is about 2.5-fold above acceptable levels for the general population, and almost 5-fold above acceptable levels for toddlers, the age group with the highest estimated dietary exposure.
The EPA is now proposing to also prevent carbofuran residues to contaminate imported sugarcane, rice, bananas, and coffee, something that EPA had earlier proposed to allow and NRDC and others had strenuously objected to.
What do EPA scientists say about the adverse effects associated with this pesticide?
In addition to the above hazard warnings that the registrant, FMC corporation, must put on the product label, it also notes that carbofuran is “highly toxic to bees” exposed during pesticide application or even if exposed to residues on crops. Yeow!
The American Bird Conservancy reports that carbofuran has been linked to the death of more than one hundred bird species, including hundreds of bald eagle deaths!
Eagles, bees, our children…what kind of chemical is this that the Department of Ag continues to defend? See the EPA response to the Ag Department’s letter at www.regulations.gov searching the following document ID: EPA-HQ-OPP-2005-0162-0507
On July 30, EPA will initiate a 60-day comment period on its decision. EPA will review comments and post its final decision, with a window for interested parties to contest the decision. This may stimulate an administrative hearing. Maybe in the summer of 2009 EPA’s final decision would finally take effect, when the final decision is published.
Don't fail us now, EPA. Stick with the science and protect people and wildlife!
]]>“When EPA does't consider how a hazardous pesticide could impact the health of children, it is breaking the law,” Said Mae Wu, health attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC). “The EPA’s approach to reviewing the safety of this chemical is not only flawed and dangerous – but also illegal. The full scope of endosulfan’s health impacts needs to be a priority, not an afterthought.”
Global calls to ban this dangerous wartime pesticide have been issued from scientists, environmental health advocates, unions and worker advocates, and from Arctic Tribes and Indigenous groups.
The lawsuit filed today is meant to force EPA to consider the health risks to children, workers, and endangered species, as required by the Endangered Species Act and the pesticide regulatory statutes (FIFRA and FQPA).
More information on endosulfan can be found at the PANNA website, and the NRDC blog on our Feb 2008 petition to ban endosulfan.
The lawsuit was brought by Earthjustice and Farmworker Justice on behalf of: Alaska Community Action on Toxics, Beyond Pesticides, Center for Environmental Health, Farm Labor Organizing Committee (AFL-CIO), Natural Resources Defense Council, Pesticide Action Network North America, Pineros y Campesinos Unidos del Noroeste (Northwest Treeplanters and Farmworkers United), Teamsters Local 890 and, United Farm Workers.
]]>In the first blog crack investigative reporter and two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Andrew Schneider blogged on Secret Ingredients about how our Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is considering weakening regulations on asbestos. That deadly fiber, possibly the most well-known of all cancer-causing agents, leaves a continuing death rate of approximately one death per hour in the United States, 10,000 deaths per year, as a legacy from past uses. Nonetheless, today the EPA Office of Solid Waste and Emergency (OSWER) is hosting a public meeting to reconsider the way it calculates risk from inhaling the deadly fibers, based on new industry calculations.
In the second blog, SafeNano, even while our regulatory agencies are putting our health and safety at risk for industry interests, another group of scientists are reminding us to learn lessons from past mistakes like asbestos. Scientists Steffen Hansen, Andrew Maynard, Anders Baun, and Joel Tickner published an article in Nature Nanotechnology called, "Late Lessons from early warnings for nanotechnology". In his blog SafeNano, Maynard notes the conflict when federal agencies are promoting industry or commercial interests: "...nanotechnology is being overseen by the same government organizations that promote it; research strategies are not leading to clear answers to critical questions; collaborations are not being as productive as is needed; and stakeholders are not being fully engaged."
The Secret Ingredients blog says, "Scientists paid by the automotive and chemical industry and miners of sand, tale, taconite and gravel contaminated with asbestos, argue that whichever type of asbestos they use "can't be harmful" because the size, shape or chemical composition of their asbestos fiber is benign. On the other side, physicians who have treated thousands of asbestos victims, and scientists who have documented the public health toll, just point to the graveyards." And now the EPA, the agency charged with protecting human and environmental health, is considering adopting the industry numbers to weaken clean up and exposure standards to asbestos. Grrrr....!
Today technical comments signed by internationally renowned medical experts and public health experts including NRDC will be presented to the EPA at the public meeting. These prominent experts will be advocating against weakening the asbetsos clean up standards because there is no safe level of exposure.
Secret Ingredients highlights a new book by David Michaels, a former assistant secretary of the Department of Energy for Environment, Safety and Health, that "documents how this bogus science is conducted on behalf of manufacturers and users of not just asbestos, but of benzene, beryllium, chromium, methyl tertiary-butyl ether, perchlorates, phthalates, and virtually every other toxic chemical in the news today."
Clearly it would be smart practice to keep commercial interests separated from regulators if agencies are to set health-protective regulations.
The ability of some nanomaterials such as carbon nanotubes to present serious and potentially chronic or deadly health effects has already been demonstrated in scientific studies that, while not definitive, are raising alarm among those paying attention. For more discussion see blogs by NRDC, EDF, or ICON.
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Imagine what our nation's health would look like if this were the policy for industrial chemicals in the U.S. For example, an NRDC report advising a precautionary approach to nanotechnologies compares modern nanomaterials to asbestos, a chemical that was new in the early 20th century. Because of our reckless and widespread use of asbestos in the United States we still have more than one death per hour—approximately 10,000 per year—as a legacy from past and continuing exposure to asbestos. The global death rate is estimated to be 10 times higher.
In April, 2007 a coalition of 11 global unions together representing over 300 million members in more than 150 countries launced a 'zero cancer in the workplace' campaign, noting that "over 600,000 deaths a year – one death every 52 seconds – are caused by occupational cancer, making up almost one-third of all work-related deaths."
Modern scientists with precautionary philosophies are turning back to the lab to re-design the periodic table in a manner that is sustainable, earth-friendly, and safe. Green Chemistry, as it is often called, is a fledgling but growing field of study; these inter-disciplinary scientific visionaries will, I hope, lead us to a future where chemistry and engineering are consistent with a healthy sustainable planet. The US EPA even has Presidential Awards for green chemistry innovations.
But, what do we do with our legacy of toxic industrial chemicals? Once a chemical or substance is determined to be hazardous, then if it is persistent, bioaccumulative, or highly toxic it should not be commercialized, and all health and safety information should be fully disclosed to workers, communities, and regulators.
We cannot turn back the clock, but we can move forward with more 'smarts'.
]]>Although the court awarded the injured parties much less in punitive damages than they had sought, the justices buried something very interesting in Footnote 17 of their decision.
In the footnote, part of Justice Souter’s majority opinion, the Court offered a short commentary, "The Court is aware of a body of literature running parallel to anecdotal reports, examining the predictability of punitive awards by conducting numerous 'mock juries' where different 'jurors' are confronted with the same hypothetical case...Because this research was funded in part by Exxon, we decline to rely on it."
In its footnote, the majority seems to recognize that industry-funded science is likely to be biased, and should be viewed with reasonable skepticism, if not rejected outright for consideration in judging a matter for which the funding industry has a financial or legal interest.
The Court’s thinking on this matter deserves consideration from the editors of scientific and policy journals, as well as federal and state regulators.
Misrepresentation or bias has been documented for industry-supported research on many hazardous industrial chemicals, including the low-dose effects of the plasticizer bisphenol A, tobacco-supported research on the health hazards of secondhand tobacco smoke, butadiene carcinogenicity, vinyl chloride carcinogenicity, perchlorate toxicity, and atrazine toxicity.
The International Agency for Research on Cancer, the premiere chemical evaluation program of the World Health Organization, observed that, “a difficulty arises when an expert with relevant knowledge and experience has a real or apparent conflict of interest. This issue has become more visible in recent years, as commercial interests sponsor many epidemiological and experimental studies and some investigators develop a history of receiving research support from interested parties.”
What is the solution? At a minimum, scientific journals must enforce rigorous policies for public disclosure of conflicts, both financial and personal, for authors, peer reviewers, news writers, and even editors. The details of a best practices policy may vary by journal, but the critical elements must include disclosure of conflicts to editors and to the public. The Court in this example could not have made a determination had the sponsorship of the studies not been disclosed.
NRDC will be hosting a workshop next week (July 12) of scientific journal editors, journal staff, scientists, and academics to develop a multi-stakeholder consensus on the critical elements of a best practices disclosure policy, with the hope that journals will adopt these elements without delay.
Journals and the public should not reject information or data based on its source. Instead, the public interest is best served by scientific journals that enforce a rigorous policy of public disclosure. Editors should take all means necessary to protect the journal's objectivity, integrity, independence, and competence as its most valuable assets.
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Although the presence of the endosulfan is not responsible for the tragic deaths, one has to ask why endosulfan was even on the passenger ferry, since it had previously been banned for use in the Philippines. Endosulfan is highly toxic, persistent in the environment, and bioaccumulative in human and animal tissues. Some in the Philippines are asking why the ban has been lifted. Senator Pia Cayetano, the Chair of the Philippine Senate’s Committee on Environment and Natural Resources Committee according to the Manila Times said: "the Fertilizer and Pesticides Authority (FPA) should explain why it had lifted the ban on endosulfan, a highly toxic chemical ... banned in many countries, including the Philippines,” The Senator further noted that, “Its hazardous effects on human and the environment have been thoroughly documented and established by experts.”
Some manufacturers including FMC and Bayer CropScience are finally doing the right thing by cancelling their registration and getting out of the endosulfan business. A media release from FMC in 2002 announced that although it had sold the chemical for over 40 years, it was selling all EPA registrations and formulations to the Makhteshim Agan Group (MANA), and Israel-based company.
What kind of business ethics must a company have to pick up the registration of a chemical that is so toxic it is being dumped by other companies, and is subject to calls for a global ban?
In this blog I have reported on a petition to the US government for a ban on endosulfan from NRDC and over fifty-five prominent international scientists, medical doctors, nurses, and other health professionals. I have also reported on a ban-endosulfan petition originating with unions and worker protection advocates worldwide. And, I have reported on workers and activists in India being threatened with jail for calling for a ban on endosulfan in their country, where workers are poisoned and even killed from exposure to this very toxic pesticide.
While the campaign to ban the use of endosulfan continues worldwide, countries and their residents have the right to know what dangerous chemical substances are entering their borders. That is why endosulfan should be listed in the Rotterdam Convention at the upcoming decision in October of this year, which would force exporters to notify potential purchasers that endosulfan has been banned in many countries, called Prior Informed Consent.
We need to continue to press for global chemical policies that protect consumers, workers, wildlife and the environment from dangerous and unnecessary products like endosulfan. Expanding the publics’ right to know about what, where, and how chemicals are being used, as well as which ones are banned in other countries, are a cornerstone of a sound environmental and public health policy.
Meanwhile, companies that market chemicals that are highly toxic and persist in the environment must be forced to stop their deadly profiteering.
Colony collapse disorder (CCD) is devastating our bees. Anything that has its own name and acronym is serious! CCD describes the estimate loss of approximately 40% of the nation's bee colonies! No one understands exactly what causes CCD, and it's probably a combination of things: disease, viruses, weakened immune system, and toxic pesticides are all likely contributers.
These little plump creatures provide an essential service, asking only for a little consideration in return. The NRDC bee experts suggest the following considerations:
Private initiatives are helping a lot! Haagen Dazs is throwing $250,000 to the problem through its new ice cream flavor, Honey Bee Vanilla. Burt’s Bees natural personal care products donated $32,000 and the National Honey Board $13,000.
What can you do? Check out our NRDC website for more info and ideas you can try at home, including establishing a hive in your yard. And, for more bee information, check out this story in the NRDC magazine, On Earth.
]]>REACH loophole #1: There is no clear guidance for how to evaluate nanomaterials under REACH. ETUC calls for the "no data, no market" principle of REACH to apply to nanomaterials, and we agree!
REACH loophole #2: Materials manufactured or imported under 1 metric tonne per year don't need to be registered under REACH. Yeow! Many nanomaterials will fall through this hole because of their incredibly miniscule mass. Without registration requirements, no safety data would be required. ETUC calls for closure of this loophole, and we agree!
REACH loophole #3: Materials manufactured or imported under 10 metric tonnes per year aren't required to provide a chemical safety report. This means no safety data, no risk assessment, and where risk is identified there would be no requirements for risk management measures. ETUC says all nanomaterials registered under REACH should be accompanied by a chemical safety report, and, guess what? We agree!
In addition, ETUC calls for more health and safety research of nanomaterials, and more workplace protections. See the full ETUC proposal on their website. Go ETUC!
Back in the good ole' U.S. of A. we are still trying to get our government to regulate any toxic chemical in a precautionary manner. When will we get a, "no data, no market" approach to chemicals? Soon, I hope!
]]>NRDC summarized the findings of five different research groups that since 2004 have reported that single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs) cause lung damage in test rodents, including dose-dependent rapid lung inflammation, rapid progressive fibrosis, and granulomas.
Carbon nanotubes are atom-thick sheets of graphite formed into cylinders. They may be formed from a single layer of graphite or they may consist of multiple concentric layers of graphite, resulting in multi-walled carbon nanotubes. They are estimated to be 100-times stronger and six-times lighter than steel, making them useful to strenthen building materials. Already they are found in many consumer products including super-strong tennis rackets, hockey sticks, racing bike frames, car parts, and golf clubs.
The ropelike filaments of carbon nanotubes are long, thin, and insoluble; these qualities are associated with the cancer-causing effects of asbestos and other deadly fibers.
In the trade press (Nanowerk), Donaldson is quoted as saying that, " "The results were clear ...Long, thin carbon nanotubes showed the same effects as long, thin asbestos fibers."
The website of the Woodrow Wilson Center Project on Emerging Nanotechnologies notes that "widespread exposure to asbestos has been described as the worst occupational health disaster in U.S. history and the cost of asbestos-related disease is expected to exceed $200 billion, according to major U.S. think tank RAND Corporation."
But, dollars don't tell the human toll. NRDC reports that in the United States, we still have more than one death per hour—approximately 10,000 per year—as a legacy from past and continuing exposure to asbestos. The global death rate is estimated to be 10 times higher.
Today's study authors report their results thus: "Here we show that exposing the mesothelial lining of the body cavity of mice, as a surrogate for the mesothelial lining of the chest cavity, to long multiwalled carbon nanotubes results in asbestos-like, length-dependent, pathogenic behaviour. This includes inflammation and the formation of lesions known as granulomas. This is of considerable importance, because research and business communities continue to invest heavily in carbon nanotubes for a wide range of products under the assumption that they are no more hazardous than graphite. Our results suggest the need for further research and great caution before introducing such products into the market if long-term harm is to be avoided."
Recklessly exposing workers and the general population to deadly chemicals is neither humane nor civilized. Our society can do better this time around. Regulators must step in and prevent nanomaterials from being used in ways that may result in human exposure or environmental releases until they are safety tested and regulated.
]]>In a letter sent today to USDA Secretary Schafer and signed by 45 prominent public interest groups including Sierra Club, Greenpeace, Health Care Without Harm, and Consumers Union, the coalition argued that the NASS’s Agricultural Chemical Usage reports are the only reliable, publicly available source of data on pesticide and fertilizer use outside of California.
Elimination of this program will severely hamper the efforts of the USDA, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), land grant scientists, and state officials to perform pesticide risk assessments and make informed policy decisions on pesticide use. In particular, USDA and EPA will have difficulty tracking their progress in meeting their policy commitments to reduce the use of hazardous pesticides through adoption of Integrated Pest Management (IPM) practices and to support IPM research
NASS has regularly collected and published agricultural chemical use data since at least 1991 but has dramatically scaled back its program in recent years. First, the agency replaced its annual surveys of major field crops with biennial ones. Then, in the 2007 growing season, data collection was limited to just three crops—cotton, apples and organic apples. Now, NASS has taken the most drastic step—announcing that it will not collect agricultural chemical use data on any crops during the 2008 growing season.
The coalition letter was released today, the day before the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) releases its scaled-back annual report on 2007 pesticide use in American agriculture, a coalition of 44 environmental, sustainable farming, and health advocacy organizations called on USDA to reverse its plan to eliminate its pesticide reporting program in 2008.
Elimination of USDA’s objective data will open the door wide to serious misinformation on pesticide use, charge the groups.
]]>The following is excerpted from website reports by the above groups:
Many cases of endosulfan-related poisoning, including fatalities, have been reported - in Benin, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Guatemala, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Turkey, and USA. It is one of the main causative agents of acute poisoning in Central America, in southern India and other areas.Endosulfan has caused congenital birth defects, reproductive health problems, cancers, loss of immunity, neurological and neurobehavioural problems amongst villagers in Kerala (India) who were exposed to 26 years of aerial endosulfan spraying on neighbouring cashew nut plantations.
Endosulfan may be the most important source of fatal poisoning among West Africa’s cotton farmers. In Benin’s cotton industry, endosulfan caused 400 accidental poisonings, including 53 deaths, between 2000 and 2003 - 69% of all pesticide poisonings. In a single province in Benin, at least 37 people died from endosulfan poisoning in just one season.
In 2007, the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) warned that “Occupational assessment for endosulfan indicates short- and intermediate-term risks for mixers, loaders, and applicators for the majority of uses, even with maximum Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) and engineering controls.”
From October 13-17, 2008 the POPs Review Committee will be meeting in Geneva to assess the potential to include endosulfan under the Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants. An affirmative response from the Review Committee would trigger consideration at the political level leading to the potential global elimination of endosulfan in 2009.
Following this, from October 27-31, 2008 the Conference of the Parties to the Rotterdam Convention (PIC CoP4) will convene in Rome to decide on the inclusion of endosulfan in Annex III.
The above groups point out that this represents an unprecedented opportunity to press the international community to impose greater safeguards on the sale and distribution of endosulfan.
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