Pesticides and Breast Cancer
An estimated 1.15 million women were diagnosed with breast cancer in 2002 and 411,000 died from the disease. There are an estimated 4.4 million women alive who have had breast cancer diagnosed within the last five years, and the incidence rate continues to climb in all age groups.
Poisoning from exposure to pesticides is a problem the world over, but most especially in developing countries and most especially for women. Estimates of acute poisoning of agricultural workers range from 1.5 million through 25 million in developing countries alone, to 50-200 million worldwide. An estimated 99 percent of acute poisoning deaths are believed to occur in developing countries.
Women account for more than 50 percent of the agricultural labor force in Asia. In Bangladesh, Cambodia, China, India, Laos, Vietnam, and India, more than 70 percent of women are employed in agriculture, with this figure rising to 98 percent in Bhutan and Nepal. They are severely overexposed to pesticides.
No attempts have been made to estimate how many of these women are affected by chronic poisoning caused by exposure to pesticides. Women in poorer developing countries are much more vulnerable to exposure to pesticides than other agricultural workers. Women who were once self-sufficient farmers have become displaced menial workers in the most marginal positions in the workforce.
Women comprise an estimated 70 percent of the world's 1.3 billion absolute poor. The number of rural women living in poverty has almost doubled in the last 20 years. Many of these women have been driven into the plantation sector or into other forms of corporate cash-cropping (such as floriculture) where their exposure to pesticides has increased dramatically. In some countries, women make up 85 percent or more of the pesticide applicators on commercial farms and plantations, often working whilst pregnant or breastfeeding. There are an estimated 30,000 women pesticide sprayers in Malaysia alone.
They spray pesticides-and frequently highly toxic ones like paraquat-on average 262 days per year. Eighty percent of the spraying is carried out with leaky hand-held spray equipment. Because of their poverty, an incentive of only 50 cents extra per day is enough to encourage women to spray.
Women work and raise their children in a toxic environment-mixing the pesticides, weeding while they are being applied, washing out the pesticide containers, or harvesting the pesticide-doused crops. They wash pesticide-soaked clothing and store pesticides in their homes.
Women's exposure to pesticides is significantly higher than is formally recognized and pesticide poisonings are greatly underestimated for women. These problems are compounded by gender biases in epidemiology. Most researchers looking at links between cancer and farming have concentrated on male farmers. There have been very few epidemiological studies investigating a potential link between exposure to pesticides and breast cancer, especially those pesticides in current usage.
Women's greater vulnerability to pesticides is also overlooked in the toxicological risk assessment of pesticides. Women's higher proportion of body fat provides a greater reservoir for fat-loving pesticides, some of which are known to be hormonally active and/or carcinogens, and are associated with breast cancer. Women may also absorb pesticides through their skin more easily than men-dermal absorption of the organochlorine lindane has been found to be three times greater for women than for men.
Women's higher level of hormonally sensitive tissues make them more vulnerable to the effects of pesticides, especially those that are endocrine disruptors, capable of effecting profound changes on hormonally sensitive tissues-such as breast tumors.
Malnutrition can enhance the adverse effects of pesticides. Where there is poverty, there is malnutrition and women are the ones that eat last, the least and the leftovers. As poverty and marginalization have deepened, so has women's exposure to pesticides increased. Not surprisingly, the corporate economic agenda that has driven women into this position has also failed to do anything to stop the escalating epidemic of breast cancer.
While billions of dollars are being poured into an attempt to develop a vaccine against breast cancer, these corporations are contributing almost nothing to preventing breast cancer from occurring in the first place. Most government breast cancer programs, driven by the self-interest of drug companies and specialist medical sectors, continue to focus on understanding the genetic factors that underlie less than 10 percent of breast cancer cases, on early detection, and on treatment with increasingly expensive and sophisticated drugs like Herceptin.
101 Chemicals Linked to Breast Cancer
Organochlorine Insecticides - DDT, dieldrin, chlordane, methoxychlor, heptachlor, endosulfan, lindane (HCH, BHC), toxaphene, hexachlorobenzene (HBC),
chlordecone, dicofol, mirex, endrin, aldrin
Synthetic Pyrethroid Insecticides - Permethrin, deltamethrin, cypermethrin, fenvalerate, d-trans allethrin, sumithrin (d-phenothrin), cyhalothrin, flucythrinate, pyrethrins, cyfluthrin
Organophosphate and Carbamate Insecticides - Malathion, parathion, diclorvos, methyl parathion, chlorpyrifos, diazinon, Other OPs: bromophos-ethyl, bromophos-methyl, butamiphos, cyanofenphos, dichlofenthion, ethion, EPN, isofenphos, isoxathion, leptophos, monocrotophos, omethoate, phenthoate, phosmet, pirimiphos-methyl prothiophos, quinalphos, tolchlofos-methyl
Carbamates: aldicarb, propamocarb, pirimicarb, methiocarb
Triazine Herbicides - Atrazine, simazine, cyanazine, propazine
Other triazines: terbuthylazine, terbumeton, terbutryn
Other Herbicides - 2,4-D, paraquat, alachlor, diuron, triclopyr, tribenuron methyl, oryzalin, ethalfluraline, sulfallate, prosulfuron, silvex (2,4,5-TP/fenoprop), trifluralin
Others: chlornitrofen, diclofop-methyl, fluazifop-butyl, pendimethalin, thenylchlor
Fungicides - Mancozeb, captafol, folpet, fenarimol, triphenyltin, captan, maneb, vinclozolin
Others: biphenyl, dodemorph, triademefon, triademenol
Other Pesticides - DBCP (1,2-dibromo-3-chloropropane), ethylene dibromide (1,2-dibromoethane), ethylene dichloride (1,2-dichloroethane),
ethylene oxide, propylene dichloride (1,2-dichloropropane), PFOS (perfluorooctane sulfonic acid potassium salt), clonitralid, chlorobenzilate
Others - bromopropylate, chloropropylate. Adjuvants, Inerts and Contaminants. Nonylphenol, 1,4-dioxane, dioxin
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