July 2002
Cumulative Organophosphate Risk Assessment Nears Completion
On June 10, EPA released a revised assessment of the cumulative risk of organophosphate (OP) pesticides. The Agency has evaluated over a thousand OP food tolerances, virtually all of which are expected to meet the highest, most rigorous safety standards. The Assistant Administrator for the Agency stated that the risk assessment conclusions strongly support a high level of confidence in the safety of the food supply. Additionally, issuance of the document meets the EPA’s legal obligations under the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) consent decree. The Agency continued by stating that only two out of the 30 OP pesticides examined, dichlorvos (DDVP) and dimethoate, were still of concern. Action on these two compounds could range up to a complete ban.
Since the announcement, activist organizations have not failed to contribute their opinion of the risk assessment, especially regarding the 10X safety factor that the Food Quality Protection Act (FQPA) proscribes to protect children’s health. During a technical briefing on June 18, a scientist with the New York attorney general’s office stated that she did not believe that the data set was robust enough to protect children’s health. Other groups under this impression included NRDC, Consumers Union, and Northwest Science and Environmental Policy Research Center. At a meeting of the Committee to Advise on Reassessment and Transition held June 19, the co-director of Farmworker Justice Fund, Inc., questioned whether the risk assessment would be able to generate a representative sample of the population that would sufficiently protect atypical groups that might be exposed to higher levels of pesticide, such as migrant farm worker children, who may eat exclusively produce being grown/harvested on the farm. The Agency representative replied that the risk assessment model takes into account abnormal eating habits, and that is why those extremes were not excluded from the database. (Chemical Regulation Reporter, Vol. 26, No. 25, EPA OPP Update, 6/11/02).
