The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) plans to ban the use of the insecticide endosulfan, which is used on vegetables, fruits, and cotton as well as on ornamental shrubs, trees, and herbaceous plants. The federal agency says the chemical can pose neurological and reproductive risks to farmworkers and wildlife and can persist in the environment.
The European Union and other countries already ban the use of endosulfan, a chemical cousin of DDT, reports a CNN blog. About 1.4 million pounds of endosulfan are used annually in the United States, according to the EPA.
Prompting the EPA’s move to ban the chemical is new data that indicates workers face greater risks than previously known. The new data, together with scientific peer review, have improved EPA’s assessment of the ecological and worker risks from endosulfan.
Endosulfan is used on a very small percentage of the U.S. food supply and does not present a risk to human health from dietary exposure, according to the EPA.
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