At least 73 million pounds of organophosphate insecticides are used each year in agricultural and residential settings. There is now evidence in several studies linking maternal exposure in pregnancy to ADHD in boys.
There have been reports of increased in birth defects, pregnancy complications, and miscarriages in babies born to farm workers with high levels of exposure to agricultural pesticides. New research shows that babies conceived in the spring and early summer have a higher risk for a wide range of birth defects, including Down syndrome, cleft palate, and spina bifida -- coinciding with a similar spike in groundwater pesticide levels during the spring-early summer planting season.
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Low levels of lawn herbicides have also been linked to reproductive problems in mice.
linkThere are also a reports of decreaed sperm count and motility with exposure to pesticides.
link linkA growing body of evidence is suggesting that exposure to organophosphate pesticides is a prime cause of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, ADHD. The findings are considered plausible to many experts because the pesticides are designed to attack the nervous systems of insects. It is not surprising, then, that they should also impinge on the nervous systems of humans who are exposed to them.
Eskenazi and her team tested for levels of pesticide metabolites in urine in the mothers twice during their pregnancies and several times in the children after birth. They then tested the children at ages 3 1/2 years and 5 years for attention disorders and ADHD, using the mothers' reports, performance on standardized computer tests and behavior ratings from examiners. After correcting the data to account for lead exposure and other confounders, they found that each tenfold increase in pesticide levels in the mothers' urine was associated with a fivefold increase in attention problems as measured by the assays. The effect was more pronounced in boys than in girls.
The study comes only three months after a Harvard study, looking at much lower levels of malathion in urine, found that a tenfold increase in pesticide levels was associated with a 55% increase in ADHD. The researchers believe that most of the children in the study were exposed to the malathion through food.
More evidence links pesticides to hyperactivity
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