While Republicans are actively trying to bring back DDT to please big agriculture, concern is growing about other pesticides and fungicides that are already out there. In your food. In your body. In your brain.
… a team of University of North Carolina Neuroscience Center researchers led by Mark Zylka subjected mouse cortical neuron cultures—which are similar in cellular and molecular terms to the the human brain—to 294 chemicals "commonly found in the environment and on food." The idea was to see whether any of them triggered changes that mimicked patterns found in brain samples from people with autism, advanced age, and neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer's.
This is initial research, and obviously mouse brain samples in a test tube aren’t the greatest analog for what happens in a living human mind. Still, among the chemicals tested, eight showed up as triggering degenerative effects. And among those eight were a couple of brand-spanking-new fungicides introduced into the U.S. only within this century. One of those, BASF’s “Headline” (pyraclostrobin), is now widely used on everything from corn and beans to fruit. There’s also Bayer’s trifloxystrobin, which is used on pretty much everything from grapes down to grass grown for hay. Both of these new chemicals routinely appear in USDA food samples.
As you might guess, both chemical manufacturers claim that the research doesn’t actually indicate how their new products affect humans. However, while we don’t know for sure that these compounds cause the kind of degenerative effects on human minds seen in the lab, we do know that they do more than just kill fungus.
Oklahoma State researchers found BASF's pyraclostrobin-based fungicide Headline deadly to tadpoles at levels frequently encountered in ponds. And a 2013 study by German and Swiss researchers found that frogs sprayed with Headline at the rate recommended on the label die within an hour—a stunning result for a chemical meant to kill funguses, not frogs. …
Studies also indicate that honeybees which gathered pollen from plants treated with these new chemicals are more likely to die from common infections. Meaning that the growing use of these compounds could be a contributor to the noted decrease in honeybees across both America and Europe.
So the chemical kills bees, frogs, who knows what else, and possibly rots your brain. Tell me again: Why did farmers start using this new class of fungicides so recently?
"Headline fungicide helps growers control diseases and improve overall Plant Health. That means potentially higher yields, better ROI and, ultimately, better profits," BASF''s website states. "It can help secure a family's future, fund a college education, finance an equipment upgrade, or maybe buy just a bit more of a vacation for the whole family."
Marketing. Possibly the only threat greater than pollution.
You try telling a farm family that they can’t spray a chemical that’s going to “fund a college education” for one of their children. That’s a hard call. Of course, once subjected to these compounds, college might be hard—for more than just financial reasons.