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Study calls for ALL organophosphate pesticides to be banned (OPs are linked to ME/CFS and GWI)

Hip

Senior Member
Messages
17,824
A new 2018 systematic review paper in PLOS Medicine has called for the banning of ALL organophosphate pesticides.

Paper authors: Irva Hertz-Picciotto, Jennifer B. Sass, Stephanie Engel, Deborah H. Bennett, Asa Bradman, Brenda Eskenazi, Bruce Lanphear, Robin Whyatt.

Organophosphates have been linked to ME/CFS, Gulf War illness, Parkinson's, autoimmune conditions such as lupus and rheumatoid arthritis, and neurodevelopmental disorders like ADHD and autism in children.

Organophosphate agricultural pesticides include chlorpyrifos, parathion, malathion, diazinon, dichlorvos, terbufos and others.

This new paper says that:
  • Widespread use of organophosphate (OP) pesticides to control insects has resulted in ubiquitous human exposures.
  • Compelling evidence indicates that prenatal exposure at low levels is putting children at risk for cognitive and behavioral deficits and for neurodevelopmental disorders.
  • High exposures to OP pesticides are responsible for poisonings and deaths, particularly in developing countries.

This new paper is detailed in some newspaper articles:

Bombshell New Study Calls For Ban On Pesticide Family Tied To Brain Damage In Kids in the Huffington Post says:
The eight researchers who authored the paper found there is no safe level of exposure to any organophosphate pesticide for pregnant women, whose babies suffer disorders ranging from impaired mental and motor skills and memory loss to autism and attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder.
The Trump administration ignited a new debate over chlorpyrifos, one of the pesticides in the family, nearly two years ago when the Environmental Protection Agency abandoned plans to ban the chemical’s use on food.


Ban entire pesticide class to protect children's health, experts say in the Guardian says:
200,000 people still die each year from pesticide poisonings, according to UN estimates, about 99% of them in the developing world. A further 110,000 suicides using pesticides take place each year.
Terbufos has been linked to lung cancer, leukaemia and non-Hodgkin lymphoma
"We found no evidence of a safe level of organophosphate pesticide exposure for children. Well before birth, organophosphate pesticides are disrupting the brain in its earliest stages, putting them on track for difficulties in learning, memory and attention, effects which may not appear until they reach school-age. Government officials around the world need to listen to science, not chemical lobbyists." said Bruce Lanphear, one of the paper's authors.



Human Exposure to Organophosphates

Pesticides can enter the body through the mouth, skin, eyes or lungs. Sources of pesticide exposure include garden pesticide sprays used by you or your neighbor, which can be tracked into the house on shoes. Agricultural exposure may occur in rural areas through crop spraying. Pesticide exposure can also occur through treating wood with preservatives, and treating livestock with anti-parastitic preparations, such as sheep dip.

Organophosphate pesticides are detoxified from the body by an enzyme called paraoxonase; individual differences in the paraoxonase gene can increase a person's susceptibility to organophosphates. Ref: 1 2 So people with certain alleles (mutations) in their paraoxonase gene can be much more susceptible to organophosphate pesticide damage.



Organophosphate Link to ME/CFS

Exposure to significant amounts of organophosphate pesticides has been linked to triggering ME/CFS. Ref: 1

In one study, sheep farmers using organophosphate-based "sheep dip" in Scotland were found to have rates of ME/CFS four times higher than the national average, implicating organophosphates as a causal factor in ME/CFS. Refs: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7

ME/CFS researcher Professor Peter Behan has long studied the organophosphate link to ME/CFS, and talks about it in this 1997 newspaper article.


Another class of pesticides called organochlorines, which include DDT and dieldrin, have also been linked to ME/CFS. Ref: 1 2 3 However most organochlorines have been banned for several decades now, with some exceptions such as dicofol which is banned in Europe but still used on cotton and fruit crops in the US, and DDT which is still used for malaria control in Africa and parts of Asia.



Organophosphate Link to Autoimmune Disease

A 2011 study of nearly 77,000 women found that those who personally mixed or applied insecticides for 20 years had double the rate of the autoimmune conditions rheumatoid arthritis and systemic lupus erythematosus.



Organophosphate Link to Aerotoxic Syndrome on Aircraft

Organophosphates are added to aircraft engine oils, and fumes containing organophosphates can enter cabin air, making cabin crew sick with neurological symptoms.

This article in the Guardian covers aerotoxic syndrome: 'There are hundreds of sick crew': is toxic air on planes making frequent flyers ill?



Organophosphate Link to Autism

EDIT: this 2019 paper links exposure to organophosphate and pyrethroid pesticides, as well as glyphosate, during pregnancy and as an infant to the later development of autism.
 
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SilverbladeTE

Senior Member
Messages
3,043
Location
Somewhere near Glasgow, Scotland
exactly what I've been saying for many years

obscenely corrupt system covering up risks AS PER USUAL
risk of synergistic effects combined with other environmental poisons (like heavy metals)
etc etc


Spraying *NERVE GAS* on your food is stupid when it has such incredible toxicity and persistance.
 

Wonkmonk

Senior Member
Messages
1,006
Location
Germany
I am thinking about this for quite a long time.

My prediction: In a few years, we will talk of organophosphate pesticides (and possibly others) like we do of chlorofluorocarbons today.

I live in a very small rural village. 20 years ago, our garden used to hum and buzz all summer long. We had so many flies, bees and beetles everywhere that we had to keep all doors and windows shut all the time. If they were left open just a few minutes, we had dozens of insects in our kitchen.

Today, our garden is dead silent and we hardly need to close our screen door to keep insects out. It's ridiculous.

When we drove with our car on rural roads at night, the entire windshield and radiator grill was full of all types of insects. Today, it stays almost entirely clean all summer long.

It's plain obvious that insects have been dying in massive numbers. I totally believe the reports that say that up to 85% of insects have disappeared. I'd say it is even more than that.

Same with slugs. 20 years ago, after a rainy day, the paths that go through our garden was full of slugs. Hundreds of them. It was even quite hard to make just a few steps without crushing one of them. Today - nothing. I can't even remember when I last saw a slug in our garden.

This is frightening, and most experts blame pesticides for it.

How can we believe that something that kills 85% of insects and more doesn't massively harm us?
 

xcell

Always looking for new knowledge and options!
Messages
94
Location
Germany
How can we believe that something that kills 85% of insects and more doesn't massively harm us?
Because most people don't read anything about it. Especially those who are using it.
They tell very bad things about biological farmers (bio, demeter) and even if they get ill from using those shit they will not believe it.
Only very rich ones know it who have sometimes many (!) bio farms over the whole world.
All others don't want to accept it and/or think biological farming is to expensive (which is simply wrong!).
 
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Wonkmonk

Senior Member
Messages
1,006
Location
Germany
Oh, and let me add one thing: I lived in a large city from 2013 to 2016 and, guess what, when I opened the window at night for a while, there was real moth invasion. There now seem to be a lot more insects in the big cities than in rural areas. No pesticides there.
 

Hip

Senior Member
Messages
17,824
A documentary called Circle of Poison examines the way the pesticide industry in the US continue to manufacture pesticides that have long been banned in the US, for export to less-developed nations like Mexico and India, where they cause lots of neurological damage.

The documentary mentions some research performed in Mexico, in a farming valley where these toxic pesticides were being used agriculturally. The researchers asked some young children in that valley to draw a person using pencil and paper, but they were unable to do this (their drawings looked unintelligible, nothing like the subjects they were asked to draw).

Whereas children of similar age in an adjacent foothills region which did not use pesticides were quite capable of making the normal intelligible drawings that you would expect a young child to make.

Here is a representative example of the children's drawings:

Drawings by children in the foothills not exposed to pesticides (left)
and children in the valley exposed to pesticides (right)

DrawingsOf4YearOlds.jpg


Source study: An Anthropological Approach to the Evaluation of Preschool Children Exposed to Pesticides in Mexico


I saw this Circle of Poison documentary on the Al-Jazeera channel a year or so ago, but it is available online to rent for around $4 or £2.50.
 
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Wonkmonk

Senior Member
Messages
1,006
Location
Germany
They may still be used illegally on a significant scale in the US (and probably elsewhere):

"In spite of regulatory phasing out of organophosphates in the U.S., we still see elevated levels and higher detection rates of several organophosphates in agricultural households than non-agricultural households, albeit lower levels than prior studies."

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5223784/
 

Abha

Abha
Messages
267
Location
UK
A documentary called Circle of Poison examines the way the pesticide industry in the US continue to manufacture pesticides that have long been banned in the US, for export to less-developed nations like Mexico and India, where they cause lots of neurological damage.
I saw this Circle of Poison documentary on the Al-Jazeera channel a year or so ago, but it is available online to rent for around $4 or £2.50.

Hip,
This Documentary was shown again recently on AlJazeera.It has been shown numerous times and one may find it in their archives(?).
The Countess of Marr also featured recently in a documentary (rt.com/Russia today?) re chemicals(organophosphates/sheep dip in her case).She is now on 16 hrs of Oxygen/day.I think Glyphosate(re Autism etc) may have been covered in the same programme.I have it recorded somewhere so I'd need to check that.
 

Hip

Senior Member
Messages
17,824
Could a parents exposure to to organophosphate cause ME/CFS in their kids?
One of my parents has aerotoxic syndrome

I have not come across any studies on transgenerational effects of organophosphates.
 

antares4141

Senior Member
Messages
576
Location
Truth or consequences, nm
snip"Organophosphates are added to aircraft engine oils" Why would anyone do this????

I thought the condition was caused by the victims inhaling (plain old atomized oil) which I would think would easily be enough to screw someone up pretty badly.

I have always maintained it was occupational exposure to granular organophosphates and selective herbicides like atrazine, and fungicides, that were not watered in. I was exposed on a wholesale level when I came in afterwards with commercial lawn equipment. (tons of pesticide laced granular fertilizers)

That and a ton of other things, too many to count over the years. Paint, solvent's, I assembled boats in my 20's so I inhaled lot's of styrene and fiberglass dust. Back than we didn't use gloves, we just washed our hands off with acetone after laminating. Most people didn't wear respirators when spraying resin, or dust masks when somebody was grinding.


I always tried to take what I thought at the time were reasonable precautions. Looking back I was asking for trouble.

I get angry when I see someone win a multimillion dollar law suit cause they were exposed to a little bit of roundup. Jeeezz! I wish that was all I was exposed to. Being in the lawn business I used plenty of that also. Used to buy 2 1/2 gallons of the 40% at least once a year.

I had one customer that wouldn't let me use roundup. She was very adamant about it. Looking back I bet she had CFS.

I think what irks me about this is that without spending millions on studies we just have no way of knowing. No matter who you are there are too many confounding factors.

And the problem is we have 8 billion people to feed. We can't do it without using these chemicals. Whatever they get replaced with isn't likely to be any safer.

These studies always allude to a solid connection but (I presume) never have solid evidence, for instance like they do with asbestos, or thalidomide.

For all I know I contracted some type of yet to be recognized virus like aid's and all my exposures had nothing to do with it.

It's all very annoying!
 

Mel9

Senior Member
Messages
995
Location
NSW Australia
When I was young I remember using a backpack sprayer of ‘hormone weed killer’ on blackberries for weeks. In shorts and shirt, with the spray liquid running down my back. We farm workers did not know what we were doing.

Wondering now: This sort of behaviour may have predisposed me to mecfs?
 

SilverbladeTE

Senior Member
Messages
3,043
Location
Somewhere near Glasgow, Scotland
antares4141
OP chemicals are used in the oil in the jet engine compressors
not my field so I don't know why precisely (anti-freeze? friction reduction?), but it is a *fact* that they are, please check and verify for yourself
"trust, but verify"


and no we do not need these chemicals to feed our population, that's the mentality those kind of people ALWAYS use
"think of the children!" or whatever slogan to push through some arrogant or corrupt demands
there are many things we could do to improve food output without such toxins, selling poisons is CHEAP and easy

simple one would be to create "vertical farms" in cities, greatly increasing efficiency of "food to target" and avoiding wasting fuel for long deliveries
and helping with inevitable famines that will occur, cities are for long term Human survival, massive death traps, alas, without inbuilt food and energy production capacity,
food production control is a method for the Powerful especially corporates currently (as Stalin and First Sovereign Emperor Quin Shi Huagn Di, or the European Medieval nobility, did in the past) to have a stranglehold on society to abuse and control, and nowadays also, energy production
see recent corrupt politicians in corporate pockets across West attacking local energy production and distribution for example of evidence for my views


oh heck yeah, we were bathe din enormous amounts of toxic crap :(
enormous in regard to the toxicity or sheer common damn sense if anyone honest had been allowed to investigate and set standards for safety :(
pal of mine has severe bone degeneration illness, he worked in incredibly polluted parts of the huge steel factory that was here, and then chicken farm where they used formaldehyde sprays (which was banned years before by European law but of course, corrupt Britain did not ban at the time)

hence my region has a life expectancy LESS than that of North Korea
 
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Hip

Senior Member
Messages
17,824
When I was young I remember using a backpack sprayer of ‘hormone weed killer’ on blackberries for weeks. In shorts and shirt, with the spray liquid running down my back. We farm workers did not know what we were doing.

Wondering now: This sort of behaviour may have predisposed me to mecfs?

I think you would have to figure out the chemical used in that weed killer, and then look up what sort of ill health effects it might have.
 

antares4141

Senior Member
Messages
576
Location
Truth or consequences, nm
When I was young I remember using a backpack sprayer of ‘hormone weed killer’ on blackberries for weeks. In shorts and shirt, with the spray liquid running down my back. We farm workers did not know what we were doing.

Wondering now: This sort of behaviour may have predisposed me to mecfs?

Back in the day the idiot's who manufactured those things (backpack sprayers) put a breather hole in the top and the threads on the caps probably were not water tight. I used to drape a towel over my back before putting mine on.

I used to always be leery of rubber gloves cause my hands would sweat and if there were even a small hole in either one I would be holding whatever chemical I was trying to avoid up against my hands and not even know it.

Respirators under optimal conditions might give you some cursory protection, but if you haven't used them in a while the charcoal goes stale and doesn't work anymore.

Or one of the delicate little diaphragms fails and you may as well not be wearing it. But you don't know that!!!!!!

Or if you used one too much how do you know when it's not effective anymore? You can still draw air through them.

Respirators are completely INEFFECTIVE for some materials, like paints with isocyanates. They leave an awesome finish, but you should never spray these types of paints without drawing in air from an outside source.

Has anyone here ever used "great stuff" to fill holes or insulate? It has isocyanates!!!! And not much of an odor to alert you to the danger. Be careful not to inhale the fumes!
 

antares4141

Senior Member
Messages
576
Location
Truth or consequences, nm
antares4141
OP chemicals are used in the oil in the jet engine compressors


hence my region has a life expectancy LESS than that of North Korea

From what I understand, dioxin is an unintended consequence of some chemical processes. Was why agent orange was so toxic. I could be totally wrong about this. I'm going from memory of what I read.

I can't help wondering if some same such process is what makes the oil they use to lubricate turbines in jet engines so toxic. I can't imagine any useful purpose for an OP in this application?? But yes the reading I have done indicates they are present.

Although sometimes people like to sensationalize such things like this. Like they will say mold makes certain chemicals that are highly toxic (in addition to mycotoxins), but they negate to mention doses are so small they are inconsequential. (similar to mycotoxins)

People that do this actually damage the credibility of victims. It is important to be fair and honest in your criticism of these companies. Otherwise you will garner more contempt than sympathy.

My feeling is that generally the people denying the connection between illness and the leakage of bearings in turbines on jet's for example, are the of the same feather as the people denying the connection between mold and illness, or breast implants, or pesticides, or pollutant's. They don't care weather it does or not they just want to discredit the victims. THAT'S THEIR JOB. And they wouldn't have that job if they didn't go about it in this manor.

And that is why you won't find out (if at all) until years later, yes these people were really victims and they were really injured. Agent orange is a perfect example of this.

My guess the reason why people like Simon Wessly and Peter White, and the rest of the "pace brigade" are defended so vociferously by high ranking members of people in positions of power is because they perform a vital service for the wheels of this machine.

A machine that protects industry from liability.

At least long enough for all the victims to dry up and blow away.

And they wouldn't be in power if they didn't do this.

And most decent honest people are blind to this. And the rest look the other way.

I have been accused of being a conspiracy monger, Silverblade, but I pretty much feel the same way as you.
 

HowToEscape?

Senior Member
Messages
626
“"Organophosphates are added to aircraft engine oils" Why would anyone do this???”

The reason is not to make the engine oil into a pesticide, the reason is to make an engine oil that lubricates the machinery under all the conditions it is exposed to. In other words it’s a very high performance oil, which is a big part of the reason why airplanes don’t fall out of the sky. Jet turbines are now so reliable that we allow planes with only two engines to fly clear across the world. Compare to piston engine intercontinentals flying with four yet more dangerous.

But yeah there should either be a cabin air circuit that can’t be contaminated by engine oil, or at least a filter and an indicator to detect and catch it if it must be designed that way. The earliest jets and now the 787 use a separate compressor for the cabin air.
 

Wolfcub

Senior Member
Messages
7,089
Location
SW UK
Monsanto's Roundup is going to be in anything we eat that isn't pure organic....cereals, grains, corn, vegetables etc. It has also been found in dog and cat food.

I live literally 20ft away from an orchard that is regularly sprayed from Springtime onwards until apple harvesting time (usually early October) The sprayer machines make a heck of a din, so as soon as I first hear them in there, I take off in my car and just stay away, and have done for years now.
The worst thing though is if/whenever they start spraying at dawn in summertime. That is around 4.30 am when they start work. I can't get anywhere quickly at that time. Just have to make sure all windows are closed.

Now weird isn't it? This year they only sprayed twice and that was ages ago. This is the year I have become sick.

Yet I have seen lots of insects here, and a few varieties of bees, plenty of slugs and snails, dragonflies, etc etc. The only things that have disappeared are the Glow worms that used to line my lane on a summer night.