The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced on December 19, 2023, that the agency will not challenge the November ruling of the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals that overturned EPA’s rule banning the use of the neurotoxic pesticide chlorpyrifos in food.
This means that a handful of chemical companies, including Gharda Chemical, which filed the challenge against the EPA’s ban, can sell this toxic pesticide again, even though it is linked to learning disabilities and behavioral disorders in children.
Earthjustice and other environmentalist groups say they will continue to fight to ban chlorpyrifos and all organophosphates.
According to EPA, alfalfa, apple, asparagus, cherry, citrus, cotton, peach, soybean, strawberry, sugar beet, and wheat, which is more than half of the chlorpyrifos used, will be allowed to have this toxic pesticide again.
EPA said it will further review chlorpyrifos food uses and restrictions soon.
“People can be exposed to chlorpyrifos through numerous sources, including the food we eat, the water we drink, and the air we breathe, it is highly toxic to bees,” said New Jersey environmentalist Lisa McCormick. “It is especially toxic to children with developing brains, with exposure linked to reduced IQ, memory loss, and attention deficit disorders, but with the ban overturned, chlorpyrifos could be used again in the production of food that might end up on your family’s plate.”
Bee colonies are in a massive die-off caused by dangerous pesticides that poison them and destroy their habitats.
From April 2019 to April 2020 alone, U.S. beekeepers lost 40% of their colonies. Bees help pollinate much of the food we produce, including fruit and nut crops, and without them, our food supply could be put at serious risk. The loss of these precious pollinators would be devastating for our planet.
“Harm from chlorpyrifos is generational — children don’t get a do-over on brain development and acute poisonings have a cumulative effect on the long-term health of farmworkers and their families,” said Noorulanne Jan, Earthjustice associate attorney. “Pursuing environmental justice means protecting children and farmworker families — EPA should act accordingly.”
Chlorpyrifos, a member of the organophosphate family, which includes sarin nerve gas, had been widely applied to crops such as soybeans, apples, citrus, broccoli, and cauliflower since the 1960s.
A nationwide reprieve happened in early 2022 after the EPA banned the pesticide’s use on food and feed crops thanks to a lawsuit by Earthjustice and its partners.
The European Union banned chlorpyrifos in 2020 after years of campaigning by health and environmental groups. By the time the ban was agreed upon, various member states – including the UK – had already prohibited its use in their fields, and studies had found the chemical in the urine of mothers and children in multiple EU countries – even Sweden, where its use had never been authorized.
This EU-wide ban “finally acknowledged the substance’s irreversible impacts for health over a lifetime” and “was an important victory for the health of children and future generations,” said Natacha Cingotti, health and chemicals lead at the Health and Environment Alliance.
Studies done by Columbia University and others have linked chlorpyrifos exposure to neurodevelopmental harm in children. Very small exposures to chlorpyrifos can cause irreversible harm to the developing brains of children, resulting in impairments, like decreased IQ, autism, and hyperactivity.
The initial ban came as a result of a successful challenge filed by Earthjustice, on behalf of public health, labor, farmworker, and disability organizations, in the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals that compelled EPA to protect children from chlorpyrifos.
Advocacy groups had been fighting for a chlorpyrifos food ban for over 20 years, as the EPA in 2001 banned residential use of chlorpyrifos because of harm to children.