[Pollinator] Federal Court Rules on Chlorpyrifos

Mon May 3 10:36:47 PDT 2021

This is great news and such a relief! Thank you for sharing.

On Fri, Apr 30, 2021 at 5:55 PM Miles Dakin <miles at pollinator.org> wrote:

> From The Washington Post
> <https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2021/04/29/federal-court-rules-epa-must-ban-pesticide-linked-harm-children-or-prove-it-is-safe/>
> :
>
> *"Federal court rules EPA must ban pesticide linked to harm in children —
> or prove it is safe*
>
> By Brady Dennis
> April 29, 2021 at 1:12 p.m. PDT
>
> A federal appeals court on Thursday ruled that the Environmental
> Protection Agency must ban a widely used pesticide linked to neurological
> damage in children from being sprayed on food crops, unless the agency can
> demonstrate safe uses for the chemical.
>
> The 2-to-1 decision by judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th
> Circuit follows the Trump administration’s decision to keep chlorpyrifos on
> the market despite appeals by environmental and public health groups.
>
> The pesticide has been used for a half-century on an array of fruits and
> vegetables. Over time, though, evidence has associated exposure with health
> issues such as headaches and blurred vision and longer-term risks such as
> lower birth weight and neurological damage to children, and pressure has
> grown for a complete ban.
>
> Thursday’s court decision gives the federal government 60 days to revoke
> all food-related uses of chlorpyrifos or to detail evidence that it is safe
> in certain circumstances. “The EPA must act based upon the evidence and
> must immediately revoke or modify chlorpyrifos tolerances,” the opinion
> noted.
>
> The judges in the majority also expressed frustration that the agency had
> gone 14 years — since a 2007 petition to pull the pesticide from the market
> — without putting the issue to rest: “During that time, the EPA’s egregious
> delay exposed a generation of American children to unsafe levels of
> chlorpyrifos.”
>
> Environmental groups that have long pushed for a ban expressed relief at
> the outcome. “The court ruled in favor of science, which has clearly shown
> that chlorpyrifos is too dangerous to be used to grow our food,” Jennifer
> Sass, a senior scientist at the Natural Resources Defense Council, said in
> a statement.
>
> An EPA statement said officials were reviewing the ruling. “EPA is
> committed to ensuring the safety of pesticides and other chemicals,” it
> noted. “The agency is committed to helping support and protect farmworkers
> and their families while ensuring pesticides are used safely among the
> nation’s agriculture.”
>
> The Trump administration chose not to further restrict chlorpyrifos in
> mid-2019, saying that “critical questions remained regarding the
> significance of the data” around whether the pesticide causes neurological
> damage in young children.
>
> Then early last year, the primary manufacturer of chlorpyrifos announced
> plans to halt its production, a decision it said was driven by financial
> considerations rather than safety concerns. Corteva Agriscience’s
> announcement came the same day that California made it illegal to sell
> chlorpyrifos — one of a number of states, including Hawaii and New York,
> that have moved to block the pesticide from the market.
>
> As evidence has grown about the chemical’s potential health risks, the
> government has scaled back its use.
>
> Beginning in 2000, companies making chlorpyrifos entered into an agreement
> with the EPA to phase out its residential use with a few exceptions, such
> as in ant and roach baits sold in child-resistant packaging. Two years
> later, the agency made additional label changes aimed at protecting
> farmworkers, as well as fish, other wildlife and water sources near where
> chlorpyrifos was sprayed.
>
> But all that stopped short of fully banning chlorpyrifos in agriculture —
> an outcome that advocates argued was overdue.
>
> In 2015, the Obama administration moved to revoke all uses of chlorpyrifos
> after EPA scientists determined that existing evidence did not meet the
> agency’s threshold of a “reasonable certainty of no harm,” given exposure
> levels in Americans’ food supply and drinking water. EPA staffers cited
> studies of families exposed to it in apartment buildings and agricultural
> communities that found lower birth weight and reduced IQ, among other
> effects.
>
> Before the ban was finalized, Donald Trump became president and reversed
> course. In March 2017, EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt rejected the agency’s
> own analysis, saying the agency would reassess the science underpinning
> that decision — the Obama administration had based its action on
> epidemiological studies — and make a final determination later.
>
> That action, welcomed by the pesticide industry and Agriculture Department
> officials who had questioned the EPA’s findings, led to a prolonged court
> fight."
>
>
>
> --
>
> Miles Dakin
>
> Bee Friendly Farming Coordinator
>
> Pollinator Partnership
>
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>
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> e: miles at pollinator.org
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