Luis Medellin and his three little sisters—aged 5, 9 and 12-live in the middle of an orange grove in Lindsay, CA-a small farming town in the Central Valley. During the growing season, Luis and his sisters are awakened several times a week by the sickly smell of nighttime pesticide spraying. What follows is worse: searing headaches, nausea, vomiting.
The Medellin family's story is not unique. From apple orchards in Washington to potato fields in Florida, drifting poisonous pesticides plague the people who live nearby-posing a particular risk to the young children of the nation's farm workers, many of whom live in industry housing at the field's edge.
The threat to children is real and these risks must be fully evaluated. In the meantime, EPA must adopt immediate protective buffers. Without these protective buffers, children face the risk of drift exposure to such dangerous pesticides as chlorpyrifos. The short term effects of exposure to this nerve toxin have been likened to a chemically-induced flu.
The short term effects of exposure to chlorpyrifos have been likened to a chemically induced flu: chest tightness, blurred vision, headaches, coughing and wheezing, weakness, nausea and vomiting, coma, seizures, and even death.
That's why it is important to petition the government to set safety standards protecting children who grow up near farms from the harmful effects of pesticide drift-the toxic spray or vapor that travels from treated fields. You can ask officials to immediately adopt no-spray buffer zones around homes, schools, parks and daycare centers for the most dangerous and drift-prone pesticides.
In the past, the EPA has not made this issue a priority-ignoring a law Congress passed that requires the agency to protect children from all exposures to pesticide, including pesticide drift. The agency is already three years overdue in setting safety standards that protect kids from drift.
