Health Effects of Drift

On this page:

• Short-term health impacts of pesticide drift
• Long-term health impacts of pesticide drift
• Children are at a greater risk
• Many health risks are still unknown
• Resources

Introduction

Just as smokers have a higher risk of getting lung cancer, emphysema, and heart disease than non-smokers, studies show that people who regularly work with pesticides have a significantly elevated risk of certain types of cancer, neurological disorders, respiratory disease, miscarriages and infertility relative to a control group with less pesticide exposure. But exposure to airborne pesticides is not limited to workers, nor are the associated diseases and conditions. The ability of pesticides to drift away from where they are applied ensures secondhand exposure opportunities for those who just happen to be in the area, through breathing pesticide-contaminated air or dust and contact with surfaces contaminated by residues resulting from pesticide drift.

Short-term health impacts of pesticide drift

Pesticide exposure can result in serious short-term (acute) health impacts from exposure to high levels of the pesticide in air. Some immediate effects of being exposed to pesticides include:

Eye, nose, or throat irritation, difficulty breathing	Nausea, vomiting
Skin irritation, rash.	Dizziness, tremors, muscle weakness
Headaches	Blurred vision, eye irritation
Stomach aches, diarrhea	Excessive sweating, fever

These symptoms can occur a few minutes to a few days after being exposed to pesticides. If you ever get sick and think it might be related to pesticides, be sure to tell your doctor. It is important to report poisonings to your doctor so you can be properly treated and the incident can be reported.

In rural areas, farm workers, their families, and communities located next to agricultural fields are most at risk of acute poisoning. Acute poisonings in urban and suburban settings are typically the result of pesticide applications in and around buildings to control termites, ants, and/or roaches, or near commercial nurseries.Pesticides applied to lawns and gardens can also cause acute poisonings, especially to children and pets.

Long-term health impacts of pesticide drift

Long-term (chronic) health problems can result from both a single high-dose exposure to pesticides and from exposures over a long period of time even when exposure levels are low. Even though people may not know they have been exposed, health problems may emerge years after a serious poisoning incident or from low-level, long-term exposure. The following conditions have been shown to be linked to pesticide exposures:

• Brain cancer
• Birth defects
• Parkinson’s disease
• Leukemia
• Miscarriage
• Non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma
• Infertility
• Asthma
• Sterility

There are many studies that show links between pesticide exposure and increased incidence of disease in people who are exposed. Several good review articles that summarize the peer-reviewed scientific literature on this topic include:

• Los Angeles Physicians for Social Responsibility's Pesticides and Human Health.
• Greater Boston Physicians for Social Responsibility's Generations At Risk.
• Ontario College of Family Physicians' Pesticides Literature Review.
• Pesticide Education Center's Chronic Health Effects Associated with Airborne Pesticides (abstracted from Secondhand Pesticides).

Children are at greater risk

Developing fetuses, infants, and young children are most vulnerable to the health impacts of pesticide poisoning. Children are still growing and developing, and they are less able to detoxify harmful chemicals. Children tend to play on the floor and put their hands and objects into their mouths, both of which may be coated with pesticide-contaminated dust and dirt. Because children breathe more air, eat more food and drink more water per pound of body weight than adults, they are exposed to relatively greater quantities of pesticides. For more information and references, see Environment California's Healthy Schools site and PANNA's Secondhand Pesticide Report (see Resources: General).

Many health risks are still unknown

There is still much we don’t know about health problems that can result from pesticide exposure. Most pesticides have never been tested for safety on humans (nor would we want them to be) and U.S. EPA's testing guidelines do not require observation of several key endpoints such as developmental neurotoxicity or endocrine disruption. Exposures to multiple pesticides are not evaluated by EPA, even though exposure to multiple pesticides occurs freqently. The non-pesticidal ingredients in pesticides (called “inert” ingredients/ “other” ingredients) can also be harmful, and they are usually not identified on the label. Find out more about the limitations of current toxicity data.

Resources

See list of resources under "Health Effects."