Esther12
Senior Member
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- 13,774
New story, maybe important, especially if it does lead on to a real enquiry. Big up to Lady Mar:
http://www.theguardian.com/environm...knew-of-farm-poisoning-risk-but-failed-to-act
Somewhat related to CFS controversies, psycholoigisation of symptoms, etc.
Mar discussing a 1998 report on this: http://www.meactionuk.org.uk/shepdip.html
BBC coverage of that report: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/211513.stm
I now can't find a copy of the report itself, but remember reading it years ago and thinking it was a bit irritating.
This is part of a 1998 parliamentary report on CFS:
http://www.parliament.uk/briefing-papers/RP98-107.pdf
Government officials knew of the dangerous health risks to farmers using a chemical treatment in the 1980s and 1990s but still refused to end its compulsory use, documents reveal for the first time.
At least 500 farmers across the UK were left with debilitating health problems after using organophosphate-based (OP) chemicals to protect their sheep against parasites, whose use was mandated by government until 1992.
Successive UK governments have claimed they did not know about the dangers farmers faced using the OPs for sheep dipping at that time and also dispute any link between repeated, low-level use of the chemical and chronic ill health, including serious neurological damage.
It has now emerged that government officials were privately warning of the dangers of exposure to even low doses of the chemical and criticising the safety measures offered by manufacturers, prompting calls by senior political figures for a Hillsborough-style inquiry.
A Health and Safety Executive (HSE) survey of farmers, released under an freedom of information request, said that: “Repeated absorption of small doses [can] have a cumulative effect and can result in progressive inhibition of nervous system cholinesterase.”
It also criticised manufacturers for providing inadequate protective clothing and unclear instructions to farmers on how to use the chemicals: “If with all the resources available to them, a major chemical company proves unable to select appropriate protective equipment, what hope is there for an end-user?.”
However, in the same month as this report was published internally – May 1991 – the farming minister at the time, John Gummer, was demanding local authorities clamp down on farmers who refused to use the chemical.
http://www.theguardian.com/environm...knew-of-farm-poisoning-risk-but-failed-to-act
Somewhat related to CFS controversies, psycholoigisation of symptoms, etc.
Mar discussing a 1998 report on this: http://www.meactionuk.org.uk/shepdip.html
BBC coverage of that report: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/211513.stm
I now can't find a copy of the report itself, but remember reading it years ago and thinking it was a bit irritating.
This is part of a 1998 parliamentary report on CFS:
Chronic fatigue has been associated with a wide range of conditions, and research in these
fields may yield useful information. Veterans returning from the Gulf War have reported
a wide range of symptoms, including chronic fatigue, and suspicion has fallen on the use
of organophosphate pesticides (one of a number of avenues of investigation). There have
been suggestions that this group of pesticides may also be implicated in ill health in
farmers.
A review of the scientific and medical literature carried out by the MRC Institute for
Environment and Health (IEH) doubts that chronic, serious health effects result from low
level exposure to organophosphates:71
Although there is at present insufficient evidence to eliminate the possibility that
subtle (ie. not subjectively apparent) effects may be produced by low-level
exposure to organophosphorus pesticides, based on the published evidence it can
be concluded that such exposures are not likely to be responsible, in themselves,
for any adverse health effects large enough to be subjectively apparent.
However, this is again an area of uncertainty, and further studies on the effects of
organophosphorus compounds on human health are currently being carried out.72
A Joint Working Group of the Royal College of Physicians and Royal College of
Psychiatrists set up to examine the clinical aspects of long term low dose exposure to
organophosphate sheep dips acknowledged that some studies have identified subtle
cognitive impairment (impaired attention and reaction times), greater psychiatric ill-
health and minor sensory changes. However, it considers that there are methodological
weaknesses in the studies, and it also considers that further research is needed to elucidate
the role of organophosphates in the health problems identified.73
The Committee on Toxicity of Chemicals in Food, Consumer Products and the
Environment (COT) has set up a special Working Group to examine the IEH report and
other related scientific evidence and is expected to report early in 1999.
http://www.parliament.uk/briefing-papers/RP98-107.pdf