Pesticides in Fruits, Veggies may Up Cancer Risk

Pesticides and other poisonous chemicals used in fruits and vegetables may raise risk of cancer in young children, warns study. Pre-school children are in particular danger of exposure to the dangerous compounds, the Daily Mail reported.

Research leader Professor Irva Hertz-Picciotto, of California University in Davis, said: "Contaminants get into our food in a variety of ways. They can be chemicals that have nothing to do with the food or byproducts from processing. We wanted to understand the dietary pathway pesticides, metals and other toxins take to get into the body."

A study of 364 children - 207 of whom were under-five - found safety consumption benchmarks were exceeded for arsenic, dieldrin, DDE and dioxins.

In addition more than 95 percent of pre-school children exceeded non-cancer risk levels for acrylamide - a cooking byproduct often found in processed foods like potato and tortilla chips. Non-cancer effects include the death of cells.

Pesticide exposure was particularly high in tomatoes, peaches, apples, peppers, grapes, lettuce, broccoli, strawberries, spinach, dairy, pears, green beans and celery.

"We focused on children because early exposure can have long-term effects on disease outcomes," study leader Dr Rainbow Vogt said.

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"Currently the US Environmental Protection Agency only measures risk based on exposures of individual contaminants.

"We wanted to understand the cumulative risk from dietary contaminants. The results of this study demonstrate a need to prevent exposure to multiple toxins in young children to lower their cancer risk," Vogt said.

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Some pesticides can be removed from fruit and vegetables through washing and light scrubbing.

The researchers used data from the 2007 Study of Use of Products and Exposure-Related Behaviour (SUPERB) which surveyed households in California with children between two and five to determine how their diets, and other factors, contribute to toxic exposure.

Specifically SUPERB homed in on 44 foods known to have high concentrations of toxic compounds.

This included the metals arsenic, lead and mercury, pesticides chlorpyrifos, permethrin and endosulfan, persistent organic pollutants dioxin, DDT, dieldrin and chlordane and the food processing byproduct acrylamide.

Toxin levels in specific foods were determined through the Total Diet Study in the US that determines levels of various contaminants and nutrients in foods and other databases.

Prof Hertz-Picciotto said: "We need to be especially careful about children because they tend to be more vulnerable to many of these chemicals and their effects on the developing brain."

The study outlines strategies to lower family exposure. For example, organic produce has lower pesticide levels.

In addition, toxin types vary in different foods. Certain pesticides may be found in lettuce and broccoli, while others affect peaches and apples.

Prof Hertz-Picciotto said: "Varying our diet and our children's diet could help reduce exposure."

"Because different foods are treated differently at the source, dietary variation can help protect us from accumulating too much of any one toxin," the Professor added.

The study is published in Environmental Health.

Source-ANI