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 The bill, introduced by Senator Tom Udall of New Mexico, would
outlaw chlorpyrifos, an agricultural insect-killer that has been
found to cause brain damage in children.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency denied a petition to ban
the chemical on March 29, and a federal appeals court on July 18
denied a petition by green groups to force the agency to reverse its
decision and enact the ban.
The bill is called the Protect Children, Farmers and Farmworkers
from Nerve Agent Pesticides Act of 2017. Seven other senators are
co-sponsoring it: Ben Cardin of Maryland, Kamala Harris of
California, Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, Cory Booker of New
Jersey, Kirsten Gillibrand of New York, Richard Durbin of Illinois
and Ed Markey of Massachusetts.
Chlorpyrifos, produced by a variety of manufacturers, including a
subsidiary of Dow Chemical, is listed as a neurotoxin by the U.S.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Agency for Toxic
Substances and Disease Registry.
"Current regulatory safety standard for chlorpyrifos rests on five
decades of experience in use, health surveillance of manufacturing
workers and applicators, and more than 4,000 studies and reports
examining the product in terms of health, safety and the
environment," a Dow spokesman said on Tuesday. "Authorized uses of
chlorpyrifos products, when used as directed, offer wide margins of
protection for human health and safety."
The EPA considered whether to ban it for roughly a decade before
Trump appointed EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt, a Republican from
Oklahoma, to lead the agency. In denying the petition to ban
chlorpyrifos, Pruitt said the EPA had previously relied on "novel
and uncertain" scientific study methods to conclude the substance
was dangerous. The agency said it was still reviewing the chemical's
registration.
"EPA will continue to evaluate the potential risks posed by
chlorpyrifos as part of the ongoing registration review," said EPA
spokeswoman Amy Graham.
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Trump and Pruitt have vowed to roll back environmental regulations
they say are harming business growth in the United States.
Philip Landrigan, a pediatrician who is dean for global health at
the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York, said three
long-term, independently funded studies showed the substance was
toxic. "Chlorpyrifos has been shown beyond any shadow of a doubt to
damage the brains of children, especially those of fetuses in the
womb," he said.
Udall's bill calls for the EPA to conduct a broad review of the use
of the pesticide to determine which groups are most vulnerable to
its harmful effects. If the review shows any people are being
exposed to harmful levels of chlorpyrifos, the EPA administrator
must take "appropriate regulatory action" within three months by
either suspending or revoking the chemical's registration or
lowering the amount that can legally be used.
"Congress must act because Administrator Pruitt has shown that he
won't," Udall said in a statement on Monday.
(Editing by Andrew Hay and David Gregorio)
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