Intentionally Exposing Children to Pesticides

An alert reader directs us to to an EPA proposed rule that directly involves children. I will review that after I have posted comments (not the reader's) pertaining to this issue:

1. Children who "cannot be reasonably consulted," such as those that are mentally handicapped or orphaned newborns may be tested on. With permission from the institution or guardian in charge of the individual, the child may be exposed to chemicals for the sake of research.

2. Parental consent forms are not necessary for testing on children who have been neglected or abused.

3. Chemical studies on any children outside of the U.S. are acceptable.

I have exactly the same response to this issue as I do to torture. I can't believe we are even discussing it. The mere thought of intentionally exposing children to chemicals (pesticides) that would not benefit them and would actually hurt them is so repugnant that it is like running a nail down the blackboard or rubbing two pieces of styrofoam together to even put it in consciousness.

That said, what does the EPA say?

Protections for Subjects in Human Research [Federal Register: September 12, 2005 (Volume 70, Number 175)]
...snip....
SUMMARY: EPA proposes and invites public comment on a rulemaking to ban intentional dosing human testing for pesticides when the subjects are pregnant women or children, to formalize and further strengthen existing protections for subjects in human research conducted or supported by EPA, and to extend new protections to adult subjects in intentional dosing human studies for pesticides conducted by others who intend to submit the research to EPA. This proposal, the first of several possible Agency actions, focuses on third-party intentional dosing human studies for pesticides, but invites public comment on alternative approaches with broader scope. (emphasis added)

To propose a ban on this activity is to suppose that this activity is currently taking place!! Do we have Abu Gharibs with children in them for pesticides to be tested?

For many years I worked in medical research. Every single effort was made to provide informed consent. I can't remember a time when we treated a child with a new drug (e.g. chemotherapy) or procedure (e.g. bone marrow transplantation) when there wasn't some benefit for the child. Certainly the treatment was stopped immediately if the side effects or the results outweighed the benefit. (I could go into great detail here if necessary).

At one point we were using a medication for children with a rare disease, cystinosis, that had been tested by the US military in the 1960's as a radioprotectant (after nuclear attack to protect against radiation injury). The safety of this drug had been determined by the Army in trials in humans. The humans were adult prisoners who took the medicine in exchange for, I assume, other considerations. The only purpose of the drug was to help these children (it did).

As for the outsourcing of testing pesticides on children, I suppose that it happens. If someone as intelligent as John le Carre in this book "The Constant Gardener"
(now a movie) can talk about unscrupulous testing of drugs in Africa, I suppose some CEO
of Archer Daniels Midland would do the same with his new pesticide. I put nothing past these grey men (and women).

Such outsourcing is as despicable and as worthy of condemnation as torture. I can't be any more explicit.