Cancers, Parkinson’s, but also cognitive disorders, respiratory diseases… The conclusions of an expert report on the effects of pesticides on health are particularly worrying.
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It was a long-awaited report. Wednesday June 30, after several years of work and more than 5,300 scientific publications analyzed, the committee of experts appointed by theInserm (National Institute of Health and Medical Research) reported on the effects of pesticides on health. A reference work, the previous version of which, published in 2013, had allowed the addition of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma (a blood cancer) to the list of occupational diseases linked to the use of pesticides.
Eight years later, the case against these products has grown even worse. To the four pathologies for which there was already a strong presumption of a link with exposure to pesticides were added six others. Parkinson’s disease, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, multiple myeloma (another cancer of the blood) and prostate cancer are now joined by cognitive impairment, COPD (a chronic lung disease), chronic bronchitis, but also in children of women exposed during pregnancy, neurodevelopmental disorders, leukemias and cancers of the central nervous system.
Farmers, children and residents on the front line
And the bad news does not end there, since a presumption of “medium level” concerning an effect of pesticides is also raised for nine major other types of pathologies : anxiety-depressive disorders, Alzheimer’s disease, asthma and wheezing, thyroid pathologies, leukemia in adults and finally cancers of the breast, bladder, kidney, soft tissues and viscera.
The links most clearly demonstrated have been, most of the time, among farmers and other professionals handling pesticides in their work, since they are both the most exposed and the most studied. Next come women contaminated during pregnancy – because the fetus is particularly sensitive to the effects of toxicants – as well as adults living near fields or using pesticides at home.
For the rest of the population, the effects of pollution of water, air and food by pesticide residues are unfortunately very little studied, because “The doses to which the population is exposed are difficult to quantify”, explains Xavier Coumoul, toxicologist and co-author of the expert report. Despite this difficulty, several possible effects are mentioned in the report, and in particular the link – with a strong level of presumption – between exposure to chlordecone and prostate cancer in the Caribbean population.
Hundreds of molecules
This pesticide, like several others singled out in this scientific work, still contaminates the environment today, despite its ban for many years. And alongside it are products that are still authorized, such as glyphosate (see box), pyrethroids or even chlorpyrifos. But for Isabelle Baldi, epidemiologist and co-author of the report, ” I know focusing on certain molecules is a mistake ”. “It is not by banning a few molecules that we will solve the problems”, agrees Xavier Coumoul, according to whom scientists are not able to ensure the safety of each product anyway: “Hundreds of molecules are on the market, while there are only 20 toxicology laboratories in France… We are drowned”, confides the toxicologist.
The authors therefore seem to advocate a more systemic approach to the problem, in particular when they recall the indirect risks that these products pose to human health. “Through effects on ecosystems”. And to recall, in conclusion, the need for “Better protection of populations”.
Glyphosate: should we believe the health agencies?
“Average presumption of increased risk for non-Hodgkin lymphoma”: this conclusion by experts about glyphosate, drowned in the midst of dozens of other pesticides and dozens of other effects, could almost sound like anecdotal. It is not so. Because behind the question of the carcinogenicity of this herbicide, a true best-seller in the agrochemical industry, in reality hides the question of the reliability of the work of European health agencies, which are supposed to guarantee the harmlessness of the many products placed on the market. However, for several years, these agencies have persisted in concluding that glyphosate is not carcinogenic, despite its qualification as probable carcinogen by the World Health Organization in 2015. Inserm experts, by confirming that serious arguments suggest a carcinogenic effect of this product, therefore increasingly question the reliability of the conclusions of the health agencies. Regarding glyphosate, of course, but also hundreds of other products.
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