Delayed Health Hazards of Pesticide Exposure
Author: Sharp, Dan S
Date Published: 1986
Pesticides have profoundly improved the human condition. Their dramatic effects in preventing crop loss and controlling vectors of disease have led to their acceptance and expanded use throughout the world. However, the powerful chemicals for killing pests have raised concerns that they are agents of environmental pollution and human disease. The greatest concern involves potential delayed health effects of pesticide exposure, rather than the relatively well understood acute effects. This concern is especially great in the developed nations, where the delicate balance between starvation and food production and between mass epidemics and vector control has ceased to be an issue. Indeed, particularly in developed countries , pesticides help to increase life expectancy and thus to manifest the adverse effects of long-term exposure. In this review we focus on the delayed health hazards of pesticide use and present the evidence for pesticides causing various cancers, deleterious reproductive outcomes, and subtle neurological sequelae. Epidemiological evidence provides the focus of the review. In some cases, however, pertinent animal and clinical research is presented to support or contrast with significant epidemiological conclusions about specific pesticides' hazards. In the concluding section, we suggest future directions and priorities for research for each of the three types of delayed health outcomes; cancer, reproductive, and neurotoxic. In each case further advances in knowledge will be enhanced by changing epidemiological research methods and focus. Replicating the study designs and focus of the past may merely add to the confusion, rather than generating information for prompt and effective public health action.
Date Published: 1986
Pesticides have profoundly improved the human condition. Their dramatic effects in preventing crop loss and controlling vectors of disease have led to their acceptance and expanded use throughout the world. However, the powerful chemicals for killing pests have raised concerns that they are agents of environmental pollution and human disease. The greatest concern involves potential delayed health effects of pesticide exposure, rather than the relatively well understood acute effects. This concern is especially great in the developed nations, where the delicate balance between starvation and food production and between mass epidemics and vector control has ceased to be an issue. Indeed, particularly in developed countries , pesticides help to increase life expectancy and thus to manifest the adverse effects of long-term exposure. In this review we focus on the delayed health hazards of pesticide use and present the evidence for pesticides causing various cancers, deleterious reproductive outcomes, and subtle neurological sequelae. Epidemiological evidence provides the focus of the review. In some cases, however, pertinent animal and clinical research is presented to support or contrast with significant epidemiological conclusions about specific pesticides' hazards. In the concluding section, we suggest future directions and priorities for research for each of the three types of delayed health outcomes; cancer, reproductive, and neurotoxic. In each case further advances in knowledge will be enhanced by changing epidemiological research methods and focus. Replicating the study designs and focus of the past may merely add to the confusion, rather than generating information for prompt and effective public health action.
