Despite global treaty, toxic pesticide still in widespread use in Calif.

[Thom Little]

Each spring, flower fields planted by Mellano & Co. turn North County hillsides every color of the rainbow and the family-owned business ships its bright harvest around the globe.

Like legions of other farms in California, Mellano relies on the highly effective pesticide methyl bromide. This chemical is the undisputed champion in the pre-planting ritual of killing virtually every seed and pest in the soil.

But the colorless, odorless gas has a destructive side effect: It eats away at the ozone layer that shields Earth from excessive solar radiation. Federal regulators say it is the most powerful ozone-depleting substance that remains in widespread use.

An international treaty has sharply decreased the use of methyl bromide in developed countries. One unintended consequence, though, has been the rapid jump in use of similar pesticides across California, raising new health and environmental risks.


http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/state/20051214-9999-1n14bromide.html

[Angry Girl]

1. WTF? Absolutely NO mention of its DANGER to humans????

The stuff drifts about in the air. It's odorless. It's a Toxicity Category I compound, the EPA's classification for the really deadly stuff.

Dangers to Human Health
* At least 19 people in California died from exposure to methyl bromide from 1982 and 1997. In 1997, a Los Angeles woman died when the building next to her studio was fumigated with methyl bromide. California physicians reported 454 cases of methyl bromide poisoning from 1982 to 1993.

* Methyl bromide is toxic to the central nervous system and can damage lungs and kidneys and possibly cause cancer. Direct exposure to the pesticide can lead to headaches, blurred vision, nausea and dizziness. Many farmworkers and residents near fumigated fields have experienced these symptoms.

* During the past decade, thousands of California residents have been evacuated because of methyl bromide accidents, including Fresno (in 1987) Ceres (1984), Oxnard (1992) and Watsonville (1990). In 1998 and 1999 residents, teachers and parents experiencing illnesses from methyl bromide organized community actions around the state to prevent farmers from using toxic pesticides near their homes and schools.

* In October 1997, methyl bromide concentration levels at Salsipuedes Elementary School in Watsonville were more than 10 times the state's safety standard following a fumigation at an adjacent strawberry field. The air monitoring, conducted by private environmental organizations, detected methyl bromide in air samples near the school as long as two days after the fumigation.
http://www.panna.org/resources/documents/mbUseInCA.dv.html


According to the CDC, INHALATION causes Dizziness. Headache. Abdominal pain. Vomiting. Weakness. Hallucinations. Loss of speech. Incoordination. Laboured breathing. Convulsions.
And don't let the stuff in your eyes, eh?
http://www.cdc.gov/niosh/ipcsneng/neng0109.html