An article by James Taylor in Environment News on January 1, 2006, concerning anti-pesticide regulations, notes ACSH's suit against the EPA and quotes Dr. Gilbert Ross:
Ironically, the Washington proposal followed a call by the American Council on Science and Health (ACSH) for the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to eliminate "junk science" from the processes by which it determines whether a particular chemical is harmful to humans.
According to an ACSH news release, "EPA routinely declares chemicals 'carcinogens' -- implying a likelihood of a health threat to humans -- based solely on the creation of tumors in lab rodents by the administration of super-high doses irrelevant to ordinary human exposure levels. Furthermore, effects in a single species may not be applicable to another species (rat tests do not even reliably predict effects in mice, which are closely related to rats, let alone effects in humans), though similar effects in multiple species might be an indicator of a genuine problem."
According to ACSH, "declaring substances 'carcinogens' (when they would more properly be called high-dose rodent carcinogens) is a chief source of health panics, public outcry, activist crusades against chemicals, and waste of resources from unnecessary abatement, cleanup, and product recall/reformulation/replacement."
No Scientific Justification
ACSH Medical Director Gilbert Ross sharply criticized the lack of science behind the Washington Department of Agriculture's proposal.
"The approved and regulated use of pesticides on crops and lawns poses no health threat to the American public," said Ross. "There is not a shred of reliable scientific evidence linking the use of these pesticides to any adverse health affect, absent directly spraying a sensitive individual with pesticide dust or spray."
Ross described the proposed notification requirement as unnecessary and misleading. "The concept that pesticide spraying on crops a half-mile away might insidiously attack human beings, including children, has no basis in scientific fact. It can only be explained by agenda-driven alarmist rhetoric.
"The Washington Department of Agriculture proposal seems to imply that spraying crops with approved pesticides is dangerous enough to warrant early notification and defensive measures," Ross continued. "This has absolutely no basis in scientific fact."