If you could prevent cancer, brain damage, abortions, premature death and groundwater contamination by making a phone call or signing a letter, would you do it?
Japanese chemical corporation Arysta is lobbying to register toxic, cancer-causing methyl iodide as an agricultural fumigant for use in California. It's intended to replace methyl bromide, which is being phased out under the Montreal Protocol because it depletes the ozone layer.
Applied as gases, fumigant pesticides frequently drift away from their targets. Methyl bromide has been a problem here when it drifted off of strawberry fields into homes and schools, sickening hundreds. Methyl iodide is a greater threat to health and the environment.
It is so toxic that it is used to induce cancer in laboratory animals. Scientists working with it take extreme precautions when handling it in tiny amounts. It could be used at the rate of 175 pounds per acre on farm fields.
Even buffer zones of 400 feet for a 40-acre fumigation would still result in a dose of methyl iodide to neighbors that is 375 times higher than the California Department of Pesticide Regulation believes is acceptable. For workers, exposures are estimated at 3,000 times higher than acceptable dose. Fumigant gases do not recognize buffer-zone boundaries.
Methyl iodide is listed as a carcinogen under California's Proposition 65 statute; it affects the nervous system, lungs, liver and kidneys; and is a groundwater contaminant.
Because it is so dangerous, more than 50 scientists — five Nobel Laureates — sent a letter to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency expressing astonishment that the U.S. is "working to legalize broadcast releases of one of the more toxic chemicals used in manufacturing into the environment."
This affects our whole Ventura County community! Today and Friday in Sacramento, scientists from around the country will review the state's science on this chemical. As scientists and policymakers weigh the opinion of pesticide manufacturer Arysta versus the health of Californians, say "no" to registering this pesticide in California! Not registering this toxic chemical will prevent its use in California. Call the Governor's Office and go to http://www.panna.org to Take Action to Keep Methyl Iodide out of California Strawberry Fields!
Strawberry growers should be asking scientists for less-toxic solutions, instead of putting Californians' health and groundwater at risk.
— Deborah Bechtel lives in Camarillo.
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