Adverse effects of exposure range from mild symptoms of dizziness and nausea to serious, long-term health problems.

Pesticides have the potential to harm the nervous system, the reproductive system, and the endocrine system. After countless studies, pesticides have been linked to cancer, Alzheimer’s Disease, ADHD, autism  and birth defects. 

Click here to go to our section on family health.

According to the National Poison Data Center over 6000 children are reported poisoned every year.

Children playing increases their potential exposure. A child playing on turf or on a grassy lawn or park treated with pesticides have close contact with the earth.

Pesticides can even be very harmful to fetuses because the chemicals can pass from the mother during pregnancy or if a woman nurses her child.

See this video by University of California Irvine professors.

Even after peeling and washing fruits and veggies, about 60 percent of  produce still contains more than one pesticide, says the USDA.

Pesticides are stored in fatty tissue where they slowly poison the body.

For example, a non-organic apple contains over 47 different pesticides that have been sprayed on the apple.

 PAN, the Pesticide Action Network, has a website that tells you what’s on your food if you don’t eat organic. Whatsonmyfood.org

Agricultural pesticides account for over 75 percent of total U.S. pesticide use. Farmers and farmworkers are often exposed to large amounts of pesticides.

Research shows that they face the risk of acute poisoning and long-term illness.

It has been estimated that between 10 and 20 thousand pesticide-related illnesses occur among farmers and farmworkers every year.

Soils are complex ecosystems containing almost one quarter of the planet’s biodiversity. A handful of soil contains an estimated 10 to 100 million organisms. See our Organic Land Management page to understand what pesticides do the soil.

In 71% of cases studied, pesticides killed or harmed soil invertebrates including earthworms, ants, beetles and ground nesting bees. Negative effects across all studied pesticide classes showed that as a set of chemical poisons, pesticides pose a clear hazard to soil life and are incompatible with healthy soil ecosystems.

A Scientific American article summarizing this work is at Pesticides Are Killing the Organisms That Keep Our Soils Healthy.

According to a national study, 90% of our nation’s urban streams are contaminated with pesticides.

Pesticides leach into our water supply through soil erosion and agricultural runoff.

When pesticides contaminate water they can be particularly toxic to fish.

Other marine or freshwater animals are endangered by pesticide contamination.

Routine use of pesticides perpetuates the propensity for runoff, groundwater infiltration, and cumulative and largely irreversible damage to invertebrates, all of which raise significant environmental concerns.

Poisoning of pets is common. For example, the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Poison Control Center handled 6,639 calls related to rodent poisons in 2009.

Read here about How Lawn Chemicals and Herbicides Affect Dogs.

The Environmental Protection Agency does not conduct independent studies. They rely on the chemical companies to do the testing.

Where are they used? When? How much? What’s in them?

Many have a secret ingredient list.

Many persist in the environment and synergize when combined.

Inactive ingredients are really not inactive at all.

Bottom line is to use organic products, if necessary, which biodegrade easily with all ingredients are clearly labeled. Those approved by the Organic Materials Research Institute(OMRI), by the National Organic Program, or similar programs, can be considered.

The EPA has determined that certain “minimum risk pesticides” pose little to no risk to human health or the environment, and has exempted them from the requirement that they be registered under the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA).

This is the list of EPA approved eco-exempt pesticides.