The organic movement hasn't been driven by multinationals, supermarkets etc. This has been a revolution
driven by consumers in search of products they can trust to be free of toxins such as pesticides, growth
promotents, genetic modification and food irradiation. Many years ago though, organic wasn't an issue, it
was simply the way things were done and food grown.
Pesticides ("-icide" is Latin for "to murder or kill" as in "homicide") had existed for centuries, World Wars I
and II served as a watershed for the modern agrichemical industry.The post war demand for high volumes of
cheap food, along with the development of potent pesticides set food production on a new course. There
are 71 known carcinogens "yielding crops. Antibiotic growth promotents did the same for animals.
Very little is known about the long term effect of absorbing tiny amounts of a multitude of different pesticides
along with other pollutents found in the environment. Many pesticides have been linked with cancer, immune
deficiencies, nerve damage, infant mortality and fertility problems (sterility).
Up to 90% of pesticides fail to reach their targets - spread by spray drift, vaporization, run off, leaching
through soil, contaminating our food, air, water and even rain water.
The notorious organochlorine DDT which inspired Rachel Carsons book 'Silent Spring', has been banned
for agricultural use for many years, but it is still turns up in human and animal milk. Human contamination
with pesticides is occurring at an early age was noted by J. Harrington in 1979 'intensive spraying of
insecticied over many years in North Western Mississipi led to such high concentrations of these pesticides
in breats milk that if it was cow's milk it would be banned'. In one study despite the lack of DDT usage
during the study period, over 90% of mothers, 84% of african American new borns and 45% white new
borns demonstrated evidence of DDT exposure
Pesticide use linked with breast cancer
 28 January 2005
Monash University PhD student Dr Narges Khanjani has revealed a possible link
between the use of organochlorine pesticides and breast cancer in Victoria's
north-east.
Her study shows up to 48,000 women in the Ovens and Murray Shire could have
been exposed to the chemicals which were mainly used in the production of
tobacco crops.
"Because this is the only region in Victoria to grow tobacco, the number of women
possibly exposed is much higher here than anywhere else in the state," Dr Khanjani
said.
"Although women traditionally don't work in the fields, they have been exposed to the chemicals which have
contaminated the food chain and have been unknowingly consumed in produce such as meat, milk and
eggs.
"Once organochlorines are absorbed into the body they are not easily secreted or broken down and are
stored in fat tissue such as breast fat."
The study was based on samples of contaminated breast milk collected in the 1990s by Associate
Professor Malcolm Sim from Monash University's Department of Epidemiology and Preventive Medicine
and data provided by the Cancer Council of Victoria.
"We used the 800 milk samples to identify areas of high contamination in Victoria and compared it to the
cancer data. We found that the Ovens and Murray Shire was the most highly contaminated region as it
showed the highest incidences of breast cancer compared with any other area in Victoria," Dr Khanjani
said.
Most organochlorines were phased out in the late 1980s and early 1990s but some chemicals in this group
including Atrazine and Triazine are still used today.
"Chemicals like DDT have a half life of about 10 years so we would expect to see a reduction in the levels
of exposure in the north-east over time and young people won't have the same degree of exposure to these
organochlorines," Dr Khanjani said.
This article is based on a press release by www.monash.edu.au |
