High level of toxic pesticide found in homes

Here’s yet another reason to go organic with your pesticides, use HEPA vacuums and air filters (and use them frequently), and remove your shoes before entering your home so as not to track toxic substances in from outside sources.

By the way, as the report below suggests, I use a boric acid and powdered sugar mix (50-50) for cockroaches and ants in the house, and diatomaceous earth for flies and mites in the chicken coops, all with great results.

(Beyond Pesticides, November 3, 2008) A new study, Pyrethroid pesticides and their metabolites in vacuum cleaner dust collected from homes and day-care centers (doi:10.1016/j.envres.2008.07.022), by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) National Exposure Research Laboratory finds concentrations of 13 synthetic pyrethroids and their degradates in indoor dust collected from homes and childcare centers in North Carolina and Ohio. The study results show the extent to which hazardous pesticides are present in indoor environments and threaten the public’s health, especially the health of children. With 85 vacuum cleaner bags analyzed, permethrin was present in all 85 dust samples, at least one pyrethroid pesticide was found in 69 samples and phenothrin was found in 36 samples.

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Children are especially sensitive to the effects of permethrin and other synthetic pyrethroids. A study found that permethrin is almost five times more toxic to eight-day-old rats than to adult rats due to incomplete development of the enzymes that break down pyrethroids in the liver. Additionally, studies on newborn mice have shown that permethrin may inhibit neonatal brain development.

Although synthetic pyrethroids are often seen as safe alternatives to organophosphate insecticides, this study clearly demonstrates that when these chemicals are applied in houses, they do not disappear. Moreover, they are making their way into human bodies at alarming rates. At the same time, there are clear established methods for managing homes and schools that prevent infestation of unwanted insects without the use of synthetic chemicals, including exclusion techniques, sanitation and maintenance practices, as well as mechanical and least toxic controls (which include boric acid and diatomaceous earth). Based on the host of health effects linked to this chemical class, synthetic pyrethroid use in the home is hazardous and unnecessary.

Link to full release from Beyond Pesticides.

Photo by oneparticularwave.