Over the last 5 decades there has been a lot of controversy about the use of pesticides, both commercially and privately.
Why? Because there are some huge potential health risks involved in using them.
Who uses these pesticides? Well, other than those who grow their crops or gardens organically, almost everyone uses some sort of chemical to rid their gardens or crops of pests.
This includes a lot of City Governments that use pesticides during the warmer months to rid Cities of Mosquito's.
What harm could they cause? Acute Toxicity: Acute Toxicities of pesticides can range from minimal levels to extremely high levels.
Insecticides are the most harmful to humans.
Many of them attacking the nervous system of the pest that is targeted.
Therefore also affecting humans and other animals that they are really not intended for.
This does not include ALL pesticides, but with some, just a few grams has potential of killing a person.
Mostly though, the majority of the hazards are caused by long term exposure or high dosages.
Some of the dangers include:Cancer, tumors, some birth defects, damage to the endocrine system, mutation of genetics, and even damage to organs such as the liver, kidneys and lungs.
(Depending on the pesticides).
Now, don't get me wrong, not all pesticides cause these chronic health problems.
Nor does any one pesticide cause all of these symptoms, or health risks.
There are other issues here, that have nothing to do with human health.
I mean, there is no way that a pesticide can be made, that only targets one certain species of pest.
So using pesticides, can kill off dozens of other species of insects that could actually be good ones.
For example: Have you ever spotted some sort of creepy insect that you could not reach or had no insecticide to spray on it? This happened to me just the other day.
I was outside and there was a huge nasty spider in the upper corner of my porch.
I couldn't reach it, and the only thing I had handy was wasp spray.
It took about 5 seconds and that spider was knocked out.
So think about it..
A farmer uses an insecticide to get rid of locus (for example) There is no way that this spray kills ONLY locus'.
Or, I mentioned mosquito's earlier.
When you see that mosquito fogger driving around town spraying for mosquito's, do you really think that it is only killing mosquito's? Think about all of the good bugs out there that are getting killed too.
Or, what about the organisms in the ground? This could possibly cause a good species to go extinct, which in turn will affect the balance of nature.
Whats the good? Well, now the question is: If all of this bad stuff happens with using pesticides, what good are they? From the perspective of the Farmer, they are great.
Mainly because the crops are saved from severe damage.
Some insects can make short work of destroying acres upon acres of crops.
Also, pesticides do have potential of completely destroying a species that are harmful to crops or spread disease.
From the perspective of the consumer, pesticides are also good.
I mean, if it was not for pesticides, would we have many fruits and vegetables in our stores? Probably not, and if we did, the prices of the produce would be through the roof, because of supply and demand issues.
So, in conclusion, it all depends on an individual whether pesticides are good or bad.
Really, they are both good and bad.
But what is more important? Saving lives? Saving populations of good insects like bees? Or keeping food costs down and keeping the produce more readily available in stores.
It's a lot to think about, when thinking about it.
But also, probably not thought about much when at the grocery store purchasing, right? Just food for thought..
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