This Harmful Herbicide Has Been Linked To Serious Disease, So Why Is It Still Being Used?

The herbicide atrazine is commonly used by crop growers in the United States to prevent weeds from taking over large fields of crops. However, according to the Center for Biological Diversity, atrazine has been linked to birth defects, reproductive issues, and even cancer.

Atrazine is effective at killing weeds that take over the crops we enjoy, but huge problems arise when the toxic chemical seeps into our water lines and gets swept up by the wind. Even in low doses, atrazine is highly hazardous to public health, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention maintains. Atrazine ingestion and inhalation can be linked to an array of health problems, such as reproductive complications, low birth weight, birth defects, and even cancer. [caption id="attachment_374315" align="alignnone" width="1000"] The toxic compound Atrazine is used as a herbicide in the United States.[/caption]

“Children are likely to be exposed to atrazine in the same way as adults, primarily through contact with dirt that contains atrazine or by drinking water from wells that are contaminated with the herbicide,” the CDC’s Public Health Statement on Atrazine reports. “Little information is available regarding the effects of atrazine in children. Maternal exposure to atrazine in drinking water has been associated with low fetal weight and heart, urinary, and limb defects in humans. Atrazine has been shown to slow down the development of fetuses in animals, and exposure to high levels of atrazine during pregnancy caused reduced survival of fetuses. It is unclear whether or at what level of exposure this might occur in humans.”

In addition, atrazine severely stunts development in frogs. Scientific studies have found that exposure to the chemical caused physical organ deformation in the amphibians.

The European Union has effectively banned the use of atrazine.

“Atrazine-exposed frogs don’t have normal reproductive systems,” said developmental endocrinologist Tyrone B. Hayes, associate professor of integrative biology, UC Berkeley. “The males have ovaries in their testes and much smaller vocal organs,” which frogs need to calling potential mates.

The European Union has effectively banned the use of atrazine, and research suggests the economic implications of the ban have been marginal at worst. If the United States adopted a restriction on atrazine, it’s likely we would see a significant improvement in public health without a noticeable negative impact on the agricultural economy.