Aerial Pesticide Spray of Bay AreaThe California Dept. of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) plans to start monthly aerial sprays of many urban areas in the Bay Area, including all of San Francisco, starting this August, 2008. They will use a pesticide called Checkmate, that comes in the form of time-release micro-capsules. The active ingredient is a pheremone they claim is innocent and only confuses light brown apple moths (LBAM), but it hasn't been tested for long term health effects, and the inert ingredients are not being disclosed to the public. Our kids will likely be ingesting it and inhaling it when they play in our gardens, parks, yards, schools, and playgrounds. More details at www.stopthespray.org and http://www.veganreader.com/ and my blog: http://kevinkrejci.typepad.com/feelthemath/environment/index.html
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Too Hard to Believe?
If it is too hard to believe that crop dusters will be flying over urban areas with products labeled "Keep Out of Reach of Children", just visit the official site of the California Department of Agriculture (CDFA).
http://www.cdfa.ca.gov/phpps/PDEP/lbam/lbam_main.html
Just be sure to ask them to prove their "facts". So far, there is no evidence of long term health effects. The six-pack of test they are conducting only tests for short term effects like watery eyes, and not ingestion of particle matter by kids in their deep lung tissue. I'm confident it will be less harmful that malathion or DDT, but they touted those as great for our health too...