Racial and social disparities in Ventura County, California related to agricultural pesticide applications and toxicity.

Autor: Temkin AM; Environmental Working Group, 1250 I street NW Suite 1000, Washington, DC 20005, USA. Electronic address: alexis@ewg.org., Uche UI; Environmental Working Group, 1250 I street NW Suite 1000, Washington, DC 20005, USA., Evans S; Environmental Working Group, 1250 I street NW Suite 1000, Washington, DC 20005, USA., Anderson KM; Peabody College, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN 37203, USA., Perrone-Gray S; Independent researcher, Westbrook, CT 06498, USA., Campbell C; Environmental Working Group, 1250 I street NW Suite 1000, Washington, DC 20005, USA., Naidenko OV; Environmental Working Group, 1250 I street NW Suite 1000, Washington, DC 20005, USA.
Jazyk: angličtina
Zdroj: The Science of the total environment [Sci Total Environ] 2022 Dec 20; Vol. 853, pp. 158399. Date of Electronic Publication: 2022 Sep 03.
DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.158399
Abstrakt: Application of agricultural pesticides poses health concerns for farmworkers and for local communities due to pesticide drift from spraying or fumigation, pesticide volatilization into the air, contamination of household dust, as well as direct exposure for people who work in agriculture and their families. In this analysis of pesticide use records for Ventura County, California (USA) from 2016 to 2018, we identified the most prevalent toxicological effects of the pesticides applied. We also developed a cumulative toxicity index that incorporates specific toxicity endpoints for individual pesticides, the severity and strength of association for each endpoint, and the reliability of the data sources. Combining the toxicity index for each pesticide with the pounds applied within each square mile section in Ventura County, we calculated the total toxicity-weighted pesticide use and identified pesticides associated with higher potential risk to health. Analysis of U.S. Census data for Ventura County found a greater percentage of Hispanic/Latino, African American and Asian community members in township sections with a greater volume of pesticides applied and higher toxicity-weighted pesticide use. Similarly, areas with limited economic and social resources had elevated pesticide application overall and elevated toxicity-weighted pesticide use. The combination of toxicological and demographic analyses presented in this study provides information that can support the development of policies to protect public health from excessive exposure to pesticides and better environmental health protection for socially vulnerable populations.
Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
(Copyright © 2022 Environmental Working Group. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)
Databáze: MEDLINE
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