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Table of Contents
Section Page Number
Introduction to Paper 3
Pesticides - General Information 4-5
Pesticides in Food 5-6
Risks to Children 6-7
Pesticides in Drinking Water/Juice 8-10
Cleaning Chemicals 10
Household Pesticides 10-11
Pesticides in Schools 12-13
Conclusion 13-14
Summary 15
Works Cited 16-17
Introduction
Children and adults are exposed to pesticides every day without even knowing it. Pesticides are chemicals designed to kill, control, or repel insects, plant diseases, weeds, rodents, and germs. Most pesticides are used in agriculture production, for killing pests found on hundreds of different crops including fruits, vegetables, nuts, and cereal grains. ... Pesticides are also used to get rid of unwanted pests in homes, schools, and parks. All of these chemicals are especially harmful to children because they can routinely come in contact with various pesticides through their distinctive diet and play activities. Pesticides can cause many health problems, but especially for children, because there are no toxicity levels set for them. In the food that children eat there are low levels of toxins but since children are strange eaters they may be exposed to very high levels of pesticides. ... Household pesticides are known to cause health problems in children exposed to any toxins. Children can come into contact with pesticides through the foods they eat, the liquids they drink, and through their everyday surroundings. As said before, pesticides are very harmful, and the use of them should be reduced drastically or more infants and children will become ill or even die.
Body of Research
Pesticides are chemicals designed to kill, control, or repel insects, plant diseases, weeds, rodents, and germs. Most pesticides are used in agriculture production, for killing pests found on hundreds of different crops including fruits, vegetables, nuts, and cereal grains. ... Pesticides are also used to get rid of unwanted pests in homes, schools, and parks. All of these chemicals are especially harmful to children because they can routinely come in contact with various pesticides through their distinctive diet and play activities. ... Children can come into contact with pesticides through the foods they eat, the liquids they drink, and through their everyday surroundings. ...
Children are more likely to be affected by pesticides than adults because they breathe at a higher rate and tend to spend more time on the ground where chemicals may settle and then enter a child’s body through breathing, touching something with a residue and then putting their fingers in their mouth, and through a child’s skin. Children are at a higher risk for some pesticides for a number of reasons. ... Pesticides will drastically damage the future health of our children if people don’t act now. ...
Every year, tens of millions of pounds of carcinogenic, neurotoxic, immunotoxic, and otherwise hazardous pesticides are thrown onto foods that infants and children eat greater quantities of than the average adult. These pesticides have been shown to cause reproductive defects in test animals and others may affect the endocrine system. Pesticides have been widely used for years without any consideration of our environment and health. Today, we are using more pesticides than ever, so that we can have the “perfect” fruit or vegetable.
Pesticides are everywhere in the food children eat and the levels of toxicity are alarming. According to the Environmental Working Group, “every day, one million American children age five and under consume unsafe levels of a class of pesticides that can harm the developing brain and nervous system” (Overexposed). Given this information, if the use of pesticides on food is not banned, these children will continue to consume unsafe levels of toxins until new laws are made which will not put children’s health at risk. ... The foods that cause the most children age five and under to exceed an unsafe daily dose of pesticides are apples, peaches and grapes. The FDA found “34 different pesticides on apples, 30 on grapes and, 28 on peaches” (Begley).
Approximate Word count = 3285
Approximate Pages = 13.1
(250 words per page double spaced)
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