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A new UC Berkeley study has found that prenatal exposure to organophosphate pesticides – widely used on food crops – is related to lower intelligence scores in children. Every tenfold increase in measures of organophosphates detected during a mother’s pregnancy corresponded to a 5.5 point drop in overall IQ scores in children at age 7, the researchers found.
Tag: pesticides
Lois Swirsky Gold, expert on toxins and carcinogens, dies at 70
June 13, 2012:
Lois Swirsky Gold, a political scientist who became a self-taught expert on the toxic and carcinogenic effects of chemicals, died May 16 at California Pacific Medical Center in San Francisco, Calif., after a brief battle with cancer. Gold, a resident of Oakland and a UC Berkeley researcher, was 70.
Prenatal pesticide exposure linked to attention problems in preschool-aged children
August 19, 2010:
Children who were exposed to organophosphate pesticides before birth were more likely to develop attention disorders years later, according to a new UC Berkeley study. Researchers linked higher maternal concentrations of pesticide metabolites during pregnancy to greater odds of attention problems in children at age 5. The study adds to a growing body of evidence that organophosphate pesticide exposure can impact human health.
