The following article on pesticide damage to children by LA Times reporter Geoffrey Mohan--who previously published an article on the Sonoma County's wine industry's use of water--appeared on the front page of yesterday's PD. However, I was unable find this article online at the PD, only by going directly to the original LA Times version.
These studies were done on farmworker children in the Salinas Valley, and they also apply to farmworker children in Sonoma County's extensive wine industry, which uses some of the same pesticides. In addition to the Farm Bureau lobbying against further restrictions for pesticide use in school zones, mentioned at the end of the article, the wine industry has also been part of that lobby.
My appreciation to the PD for publishing this article. It is too bad that it does not assign PD reporters to do such serious studies of the multiple damages of the wine industry to humans, other animals, and the environment itself. It seems as if they are covering-up how deadly the wine industry is to the health of children, as well as farmworkers. The many costs of SoCo's huge wine industry far outweigh its limited economic benefits to a few. The organophosphates and chlorpyrifos pesticides mentioned here have been banned from home use. They should be banned from agricultural use.
Shepherd
Pesticides as bad for kids' lungs as cigarette smoke, study says
BY GEOFFREY MOHAN, December 3, 2015, Los Angeles Times
Chronic exposure to pesticides can damage children's lung function by about as much as secondhand cigarette smoke does, according to a study of farmworker children in the Salinas Valley.
The long-term study of 279 children from farmworker families is the first to suggest that even being one step removed from pesticides can bring harm to children's lungs. Previous studies examined effects on adults who spray the chemicals or work in fields where the pesticides are applied.
"This is really the first time that it’s a residential population, and a residential population of children,” said study coauthor Brenda Eskenazi, an epidemiologist at UC Berkeley.
The children have been followed since birth as part of a broader study that began about 15 years ago with 601 pregnant women in the Salinas Valley, conducted by the Center for the Health Assessment of Mothers and Children of Salinas, CHAMACOS.
Previous studies from that group have turned up correlations between organophosphate exposure to pregnant women and shorter-duration pregnancies, diminished reflexes in their babies, and lower cognitive function in older children.
Continue reading here: https://www.latimes.com/business/la-...202-story.html