Threatened
Waters:
Turning the Tide on Pesticide Contamination
Water is the most basic building block of life. Clean water is essential for human health, wildlife, and a balanced environment. Yet, water is being polluted at unprecedented rates, with pesticides, industrial chemicals, nutrients, metals, and other contaminants. Studies of major rivers and streams find that 90% of fish, 100% of surface water samples, and 33% of major aquifers contain one or more pesticides at detectable levels. As a result of pesticide contamination of streams, rivers, lakes, and underground water supplies, drinking water is also widely contamined. With a crisis in safety looming, steps can and must be taken to curtail pesticide use and adopt alternative practices and products to protect the nation's waterways. Download brochure.
Take Action:
Bill Threatens to Exempt Pesticide from Environmental Laws: Oppose HR 872
Without a hearing, the Senate Agriculture Committee voted to strip states and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) of their fundamental responsibility to protect our nation’s waters from toxic pesticides. HR 872 amends the Clean Water Act (CWA) and federal pesticide law to prohibit authorities from requiring a permit for the discharge of pesticides in waterways. Having already passed the House of Representatives, the fate of our nation's waters rests in the hands of the Senate. Ask your Senators to oppose HR 872, the pesticide industry’s latest move in their assault on our environmental laws.
- Read "Theatened Waters: Congressional assault on our environmental laws," from the Summer 2011 issue of Pesticides and You.
Did you know?
- Human health effects, including low birth weights, breast cancer, and low sperm counts are linked to herbicide-contaminated water;
- Frogs exhibit hermaphrodism when exposed to legally allowable levels of the herbicide atrazine in waterways;
- Dozens of pesticides and their degradation products contaminate waterways and escape regulatory oversight;
- Runoff from urban lawn pesticides contaminates local watersheds and stresses municipal water treatment; and,
- Children are not adequately protected by federal limits of pesticides in water.
For
more information, download the full,
28-page color booklet (1 Mb), Threatened Waters:
Turning the Tide on Pesticide Contamination.
Contact Beyond Pesticides to order color hardcopies of the brochure, 202-543-5450.
A full cited version available to download. You may also download a shorter cited article version of Threatened Waters article published in the Winter 2005-2006 issue of Pesticides and You (Vol 25, No. 4).