Hey everyone!
I recently looked at the What's On My Food? website and found out more about the pesticides that were most likely on my dinner last night.
Green beans:
As mentioned on the Eat the Peach, Not the Pesticide webpage, eating a serving of U.S.-grown green beans is 200 times riskier than eating a serving of U.S.-grown broccoli! The What's On My Food? website backed this up with the following results: 7 known or probable carcinogens, 21 suspected hormone disruptors, 11 neurotoxins, and 8 developmental or reproductive toxins.
Rice:
After initially thinking that rice would be much safer to eat than green beans, I discovered on the What's On My Food? website that I was completely wrong. I found the following: 4 known or probable carcinogens, 10 suspected hormone disruptors, 2 neurotoxins, and 3 developmental or reproductive toxins.
Overall, I'm worried about the potential for these toxins to accumulate throughout an individual's lifetime. As public health practitioners, we must hold systems accountable and advocate for broader regulation of pesticides. In thinking of my hometown in the Central Valley, I am most worried about the children of agricultural farmworkers; exposure to these pesticides is detrimental to their health. Besides the impact that these pesticides can have on the health of humans, I also noticed that the pesticides most commonly found on green beans and rice are also honeybee toxins. If we know that pollinators have been disappearing over the past several years, why haven't we begun to look more critically toward pesticides being used for agriculture?
I recently looked at the What's On My Food? website and found out more about the pesticides that were most likely on my dinner last night.
Green beans:
As mentioned on the Eat the Peach, Not the Pesticide webpage, eating a serving of U.S.-grown green beans is 200 times riskier than eating a serving of U.S.-grown broccoli! The What's On My Food? website backed this up with the following results: 7 known or probable carcinogens, 21 suspected hormone disruptors, 11 neurotoxins, and 8 developmental or reproductive toxins.
Rice:
After initially thinking that rice would be much safer to eat than green beans, I discovered on the What's On My Food? website that I was completely wrong. I found the following: 4 known or probable carcinogens, 10 suspected hormone disruptors, 2 neurotoxins, and 3 developmental or reproductive toxins.
Overall, I'm worried about the potential for these toxins to accumulate throughout an individual's lifetime. As public health practitioners, we must hold systems accountable and advocate for broader regulation of pesticides. In thinking of my hometown in the Central Valley, I am most worried about the children of agricultural farmworkers; exposure to these pesticides is detrimental to their health. Besides the impact that these pesticides can have on the health of humans, I also noticed that the pesticides most commonly found on green beans and rice are also honeybee toxins. If we know that pollinators have been disappearing over the past several years, why haven't we begun to look more critically toward pesticides being used for agriculture?
That is such a real fear, there really is no knowing what the total effect is on the populations in the central valley communities, and I do not feel that proper longitudinal studies have been down to truly show the negative health effects that the pesticides do bring to its population.
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