Tag Archives: pesticide

US Federal Government Taking Aim at Protecting Pollinators

A guest post by Richard J Wenning, Editor-in-Chief, Integrated Environmental Assessment and Management (IEAM).

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Next week is in the US (June 15-21, 2015), and a good time to consider the importance of bees, birds, butterflies, and bats for a healthy ecosystem. Pollinators contribute more than to the US economy by tending to the vineyards, orchards, farmlands, nurseries, and countless acres of open space used by tourists every year. Pollinating requires a significant natural work force. But right now, nature’s workers are not doing so well. Continue reading

Pesticides and Mosquito Control for West Nile Virus: Potential Toxic Effects on Aquatic Systems

By Roberta Attanasio, IEAM Blog Editor

The influence of climate change on the spread of infectious diseases is a topic that generates intense debate, mostly because these effects depend on a variety of intertwined, variable factors – wealth of nations, healthcare infrastructure, availability of vaccines and drugs as well as ability to control vectors such as mosquitoes, ticks, snails, and others. Vector control is, indeed, one of the most important measures included in the existing global strategy to fight infectious diseases. Continue reading

Exposure to Pesticides May Contribute to the Development of Parkinson’s disease

By Roberta Attanasio, IEAM Blog Editor

For the past few years, Parkinson’s disease and its association with exposure to pesticides has been the topic of a hot debate – one after the other, studies have shown a clear epidemiologic link between disease development and pesticide exposure without, however, identifying any related mechanism of action. Finally, in January 2013, in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences pointed out a mechanism of action for the fungicide benomyl, a persistent pesticide that is still present in the environment despite having been banned by the U.S. in 2001. Now, results from in the current issue (February 4, 2014) of the journal Neurology show that several additional pesticides may be involved in the development of Parkinson’s disease, with a mechanism similar to that described for benomyl. Continue reading