In uk.rec.gardening Oz wrote:
: Tim Tyler writes
:It does seem likely that these statistics are unlikely to cover many of
:the slower deaths from pesticide exposure.
: What slower deaths?
: Give me a government website giving these consumer deaths.
Ones from pancreatic cancer - for example:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/q...&dopt=Abstract
....or liver cancer:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/q...&dopt=Abstract
:Accidents. If the toxic chemical had not been around in the first
:place they would never have happened. In such cases it's harder
:to avoid pointing the finger at the pesticides making the environment
:a more dangerous place by their presence.
: So ban knives, cars and alarm clocks first.
: Rather than something that is completely safe when used as directed.
Whoa - I don't want pesticides banned.
[snip material about detecting fungal growth]
:::However, if they wind up on the produce, consumers should expect to
:::see them on the label.
::
::: No need, current use of pesticides leaves minute, usually undetectable,
::: residues which are perfectly safe.
::
::Levels of safety of most pesticides are not known.
:
:: ********.
:
:It's true. Science doesn't offer certainty - and there are a very
:large number of ways in which human health can be adversely affectd -
:it's impossible to test them all - and testing is usually the only
:way to be at all sure.
: Certainty is NOT the same as 'the levels of safety are well known'.
: Nobody can ever be certain about anything, so it's a moronic thing to
: say.
I'm merely pointing out that the safely of pesticides remains
open to doubt.
Government regulators have demonstrably been wrong before on the
subject - with unpleasant consequences.
:Of course there are ethical problems associated with testing
:pesticides on humans. This makes things even harder - often
:the very tests that are most needed can't legally be performed.
: They aren't needed. [...]
Not if you simply put your trust in the government regulators
as guardians of the truth, no.
They have a lot of pesticides to examine - and don't have
unbounded resources.
I expect to see more mistakes - though perhaps not quite on the
grand scale of previous screw-ups.
:: I quoted some of the info. ALL approved pesticides have a
:: full toxicology, far far more detailed than pharmaceuticals or
:: materials you find in the home (plastics and detergents for example).
:
:: And that is despite the fact that your consumption of residual pesticide
:: remnants and residues is at worst in microscopic quantities.
:
:Plastics tend to be inert.
: Take a look at pthalates used in plastic manufacture.
: Take a look at the carcinogenic properties of benzene (in your fuel
: tank).
Which is why I said "tend to be" rather than "are".
:Detergents are often poisonous.
: Yet you wash your veg for ten minutes in them.
Uh - how do you know how I treat my vegetables!?!
I never put my vegetables anywhere near detergents.
:I can easily believe more effort is put into testing pesticides
:than detergents - but that hardly means that they are safe.
: It does, because they must pass ALL the tests to be approved.
You presume an exhaustive set of tests. A false presumption.
::Scientific investigations have difficulty showing things are
::safe in long-lived organisms like us. Lifetime trials are
::frequently required - probably across multiple generations -
::before you can claim something is safe with much in the way
::of certainty. Such trials have not been performed in humans.
:
:: They have been performed in a range of mammals and appropriate safety
:: levels set. If you followed your dictum then we should not be using any
:: modern plastics, paints and other things found in life. Indeed many of
:: them have been shown to be toxic, yet they are still used because people
:: want their utility.
:
:I don't mind other people eating pesticides - if they choose to.
: Remember antibiotics are a pesticide, too.
Of sorts.
: One little pill probably contains more than a lifetimes exposure to
: pesticide residues.
On what scale?
:Basically what I want is more ability to control my own level
:of pesticide consumption - so I can down-regluate it in areas
:I am concerned about.
: Then don't buy organic. [...]
You seem to have "a thing" about organic produce.
It seems to be contrary to the evidence suggesting pesticide residues
are lower on organic produce.
:Doing that today would restrict the diversity of foods available
:in my diet.
: Tough. Grow your own food.
Yes, I do. I just have not yet managed to grow *all* my own food.
:: Labs are not particularly 'low disease', no high accumulation
:: of animals ever is.
:
:Yes they are. Disease is often a function of the environment.
: Quite, and packing lots of animals together tends to a high disease
: challenge.
For some diseases - whereas very many other infectious diseases are
completely absent, since their germ line was not present in the
founders - and there's no outside contact.
:Lab animals are in a highly artificial environment - and face
:different challenges. For example normally there are no predators.
: Predators are not diseases.
: Few farm livestock have predators either.
: No difference there.
We are not talking about farm animals.
We are talking about pesticide trials on animals - and whether they
are an adequate model for humans.
Humans certainly *are* hunted on occasion - mainly by other humans.
::I don't regard today's level of testing pesticides to provide
::much more than minimal protection.
:
:: Then you are an idiot or quite ignorant about it.
:
:I mean that it's minimal compared to what it could be - not that
:it doesn't protect people from pesticides at all.
: At 50M quid a hit, more than has been spent on plant toxin research
: since the dawn of time, it's most certainly not minimal but (in the view
: of manufacturers) excessive overkill.
:In other words the safely level could usefully be many times higher -
: How?
In most cases by using less.
:and the risk could be made many times lower.
: How do you know?
It stands to reason that we are not yet on the pinaccle of pesticide
safety. We are still in the biotech dark ages - there's very much we
don't know - and ignorance is dangerous.
: We are using the safest products ever found right now.
I don't doubt that - and safety will hopefully continue to improve.
::: Obviously you couldn't use the same safety spec as for pesticides as
::: you would have few, probably no, allowed food plants.
::
::I think you'll find eating no food at all kills you fairly rapidly.
:
:: Yes but:
:
:: 1) I could select less toxic plant foods.
:: 2) I could use low toxicity cultivars.
:
:Well only up to a point - eventually you will run out of less-toxic
:foods to switch to.
: Indeed, but you could influence it.
I do try to do that. I also try to have a very diverse diet -
in an attempt to prevent too much of any one thing causing harm.
: Of course the big problem, and why no significant work has been done, is
: that everyone expects plant toxins to be so dangerous that all vegetable
: foods would have to be banned for safety reasons. Nobody wants to go
: down that route.
Frankly, I can't see it as a likely scenario.
:: Noting the strong relationship between plant toxins and pest resistance
:: (it's why the toxins are there in the first place) it would almost
:: certainly be safer to use plants bred for low toxin production and use
:: the much safer pesticides to control the pests.
:
:You seem heavily in favour of spending pesticide research dollars
:on eliminating natural food toxins - perhaps by breeding.
: Hardly. We would need more and much better pesticides to keep pests off
: the very highly disease susceptible plants that would result.
:/Eventually/ I would rather have safe man-made toxins to deter
:predators than poisonous natural ones. However - currently -
:many of the natural toxins have their upsides - often in the
:form of cancer prevention.
: Claims rarely (if ever) supported by solid evidence.
I don't agree. There is pretty extensive evidence for the anti-cancer
activity of many plants - IMO.
:E.g.:
:
:L-Canavanine
:A Potential Chemotherapeutic Agent for Human Pancreatic Cancer
:
http://www.szp.swets.nl/szp/journals/pb363194.htm
:
:Resveratrol - which belongs to a group of compounds known as stilbenes,
:which are spontaneously synthesized on the surface of grapes as an immune
:response to attack by fungal diseases - and improves heart health;
:
:Glycosides:
:
http://www.ansci.cornell.edu/plants/.../glucosin.html
:
:...and Phytoestrogens:
:
http://www.herbalchem.net/Introductory.htm
:
:I'm not sure it would be a good idea to breed such "toxic"
:agents out of food - since one of the things they are good at
:killing is human cancers.
: They may also *cause* human cancers, cell killers often do.
Very probably - most things give you some sorts of cancer and
suppress others - but the net result is that the overall incidence
of cancer mortality falls - for a good many green vegetables,
anyway.
:The natural toxins have been around longer,
:our bodies have had a chance to get used to them -
:and there has been more opportunity for study.
: 1) So what if they have been around longer. Think strychnine.
: 2) Our bodies didn't evolve to consume a small range of food plants.
: Take out the brassicae and solanum groups and there isn't much left.
: 3) There has been virtually NIL study on plant toxins.
: So wrong on all three counts.
We know a fair bit indirectly about plant toxins from the study of
human nutrition. It may not have been medicine's most explored area - but
to say we know "virtually NIL" on the subject seems like an overstatement
to me.
::Eating fruit and vegetables is important to good health.
:
:: Eating healthy meat and veg is, and pesticides help enormously here.
:: Not only that, but the abundance of food available today is DIRECTLY
:: the result of the introduction of safe effective pesticides.
:
:...amongst many other modern farming techniques - including the
:use of machinery -
: Irrelevant. It does nothing more than could be and was done by hand
: (better).
You're mistaken there...
:and things like a global market in seeds and produce.
: That's always been there (not that it has any relevance to your
: submission).
....and there.
:I suspect that eventually mechanical barriers to pests will eventually
:make many of today's pesticides redundant.
: Dream on, you have no idea what you are talking about.
Rather obviously, I'm talking about growing a greater proportion of
things "under glass" - or in controlled environments.
You may have noticed that there's been something of a trend in that
direction over the last hundred years.
--
__________
|im |yler
http://timtyler.org/