CFS Statement on the Ninth Circuit Opinion Ordering EPA to Prohibit Chlopyrifos
August 09, 2018
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CFS Statement on the Ninth Circuit Opinion Ordering EPA to Prohibit Chlopyrifos
"The medical literature is clear. The public is clear. Now our laws are clear too. There is no place for toxic brain harming chemicals in our agricultural economy. We must choose the health of our children first," said Ashley Lukens, director of Hawai'i Center for Food Safety.
Obama's EPA had been on track to ban chlorpyrifos nationwide before those plans were scrapped when the agency's leadership switched to now-former administrator Scott Pruitt under the Trump administration. After the about-face at the federal level, CFS led a rigorous campaign of Hawai'i residents demanding a prohibition on chlorpyrifos at the state level. The campaign was a success as the Hawai'i State Legislature passed SB3095 in June and made history as Hawai'i became the first state in the U.S. to ban chlorpyrifos. The toxic pesticide had been heavily sprayed in Hawai'i due to the production of genetically engineered seed corn by agrichemical giants Dow AgroSciences and Syngenta.
Long term studies from EPA and the National Institutes of Health demonstrate that when pregnant women are exposed to chlorpyrifos, their children grow up to have lower IQ scores, increased rates of ADHD, and poorer mental development than unexposed children. Chlorpyrifos is also an environmental threat, as it is highly toxic to bees, birds, aquatic invertebrates, freshwater fish, and marine organisms. EPA has concluded that chlorpyrifos is likely to adversely affect hundreds of thousands of threatened or endangered species.
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