Toxic Shock: The Links between Pesticides and Cancer

This is compelling stuff that we have to take seriously. Whilst a UK focussed article, the risks are common to Australia as well. In our view, we eat organic because why take the risk when the evidence is emerging? The dangers of chemicals and pesticides are becoming increasingly apprarant and we dont want to wait until it is 100% certain before changing our eating habits. As the article says "the time lapse makes it hard to research any link with disease"

Cancer and Pesticides Link

A new link has been found between cancer and pesticides. According to a recent study by Belgian toxicologist Dr Charles Charlier, women with breast cancer are five to nine times more likely to have pesticide residues in their blood than those who do not.1 The doctors found hexachlorobenzene and DDT, banned in Europe for over a decade but still present in the environment.

Studies have shown that there are over 500 chemicals in our bodies which were not there 50 years ago. Meanwhile cancer is on the increase. So how strong is the link between cancer and the chemicals used in farming?

Part of the problem with pesticides (which include herbicides and fungicides) is that they just don't fade away. Often stable and persistent, they can be found decades later in the environment, and subsequently collect in our fatty tissue. This time lapse makes it hard to research any link with disease.

Several studies have shown, however, that those with high exposures to pesticides, like farm workers, have higher incidences of cancer.2,3 Despite this, government bodies, like the Food Standards Agency (FSA), argue that by the time pesticide-sprayedfood reaches the table, the chemicals are hardly a health risk. With this kind of attitude, it follows that government testing may be half-hearted.

Inadequate testing

So-called safe limits of pesticides for humans are established by testing the effects of different levels of the chemicals on laboratory rats and mice. How safe is safe? The Soil Association believes any exposure to these toxins is a potential health risk.

When pesticides turn up in food, they are called residues. No government testing is carried out on the impact of residues on children, despite their extra vulnerability (children absorb more toxins per kilo of body weight and their bodies are less able to break them down). As for monitoring methods, they are hit and miss: although staples such as milk, potatoes and bread are checked annually, there is little consistency for other foods. Coffee, for instance, has never been tested.

The government's Pesticide Residues Committee's latest annual report found that, out of 4,000 samples, nearly a third contained pesticides residues, with one in a hundred over permitted levels.

Even the FSA is now beginning to recognise that organic food may provide the reassurance consumers need. Last June, the chair of the FSA, Sir John Krebs, said, "Organic food contains fewer residues of pesticides used in conventional agriculture, so buying organic is one way to reduce the chances that your food contains these pesticides."

Hormones disrupted

The apparent cancer link may be related to the impact of some pesticides on human hormones, says Shane Heaton, author of the Soil Association's Organic Farming, Food Quality and Human Health. "Some pesticides mimic the hormone oestrogen, potentially disrupting the fine hormonal balance in our bodies, and this may be why incidences of hormone related cancers such as breast, prostrate, ovarian and testicular cancers are on the increase," he says.

This area has been explored by Miriam Jacobs of the University of Surrey. "It should come as no surprise that many pesticides interfere with hormone pathways, as they are designed to interfere with these systems," she writes on the Pesticide Action Network website, "for instance, insecticides which disrupt the hormonal systems that control moulting."5 Atrazine, a herbicide commonly used on maize, and listed by the US Environmental Protection Agency as a potential carcinogen, has been shown to be a powerful disrupter of oestrogen mechanisms in rodents, reports Miriam Jacobs.

These concerns are echoed by the Royal Society which recommends that, "human exposure to endocrine disrupting chemicals (especially during pregnancy) should be minimised on grounds of prudence."

Cocktail effect

A further concern is the 'cocktail effect' –what happens when different types of pesticides are sprayed on crops. Studies show that combinations of low-level insecticides, herbicides and nitrates can affect our health in ways that chemicals in isolation do not.Eventually, after years of pressure from the Soil Association and others, a report was produced in 2002 expressing disquiet about the risks of combining chemicals. According to the FSA, recommendations are currently being considered under its pesticide action plan, but it will be a while before we know how effectively these will be implemented.

While waiting for the authorities to pronounce on pesticides, the Soil Association believes that sufficient evidence already exists to make an informed choice about the food we eat. This is the precautionary principle; if there is a potential risk, why take it? We know that agrichemicals are potentially toxic and there is too little control over how they are used. We also know that they are not necessary.

Organic farming works. It is founded on the belief that a healthy soil yields healthy plants which are therefore robust enough to resist disease and attack by pests. For instance, because organic crops grow slowly, in a fertile and living soil, they have thicker cell walls providing a natural barrier to pests.

Compared to the 430 pesticides allowed in non-organic agriculture, only a tiny number (seven, of which five are restricted) are allowed by the Soil Association – and only then if organic methods are inadequate. Yet UK agriculture uses a massive 25,000 tonnes of pesticides each year.How much evidence do we need to show that organic food reduces our exposure to cancer-causing chemicals? A new study from Seattle analysed the urine of two groups of children and reported that those eating organic fruits and vegetables are more protected from pesticides than children eating non-organic produce.

Organic food not only has the potential to protect us against cancer by lowering the toxic burden from our polluted world but evidence suggests that the increased levels of antioxidants in organic food help combat the damage caused by carcinogenic chemicals. While government bodies sit on the fence, you can take your health into your own hands by choosing organic food.