Chemicals to Avoid During Pregnancy: Pesticides and Herbicides

Reader Contribution by Jessica Kellner

The next on my list of most important chemicals to avoid during pregnancy is fairly broad, but increasing evidence shows the importance of reducing our fetuses’ exposure to this group of chemicals: pesticides and herbicides.

What Are Pesticides and Herbicides?

Most of us are exposed to a wide range of pesticides and herbicides daily. Pesticide residue lingers on non-organic fruits and vegetables, agricultural runoff leaves at least low levels of pesticides in many municipalities’ water supply, and we can be exposed to pesticides and herbicides in our yards if we use chemical insect- or weed-control.

Pesticides can have multiple dangerous effects on fetuses, especially in the developmental stages, when human babies are little bigger than insects themselves. A recently released study found that common levels of exposure to pesticides may have effects on developing fetuses similar to those associated with smoking — earlier birth and lower birth rates. As the Huffington Post reports: “Lanphear and his team calculated an average 150-gram reduction in baby birthweight (about one-third of a pound) and a half-a-week earlier welcome into the world when they compared the 15 percent of the women in the study with the highest exposure to the 15 percent studied who had the lowest exposure to organophosphate pesticides, as estimated from chemical byproducts in their urine. The high exposure women had 10 times the level of pesticide in their bodies as those in the low exposure group.”

In another recent article, published on Truthout, writer Brian Moench points out that nearly all of us have some level of pesticides in our bodies, quoting a disturbing recent study that showed that every human tested had the world’s most popular pesticide, Roundup, detectable in their urine at concentrations between five and 20 times the level considered safe for drinking water. He then draws parallels between research finding that pesticide exposure — designed to disrupt insects’ nervous systems — and rising autism rates — a complex disorder of the central nervous system.

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