Pesticides safety evaluation

TABLE 5.24 Toxicity Studies for Safety Evaluation of Drugs, Pesticides, Food Additives, and Other Chemicais Utilizing Experimental Animals and Other Systems Required by Health Authorities... 

Isshiki K, Miyata K, Martsui S, et al. 1983. [Effects of post-harvest fungicides and piperonyl butoxide on the acute toxicity of pesticides in mice. Safety evaluation for intake of food additives. III]. 

Khera KS. 1976. Distribution, metabolism and perinatal toxicity of pesticides with reference to food safety evaluation Review of selected literature. Adv Mod Toxicol (Part 1) 369-420. 

There are many different examples of species differences in the toxicity of foreign compounds, some of which are commercially useful to man, as in the case of pesticides and antibiotic drugs where there is exploitation of selective toxicity. Species differences in toxicity are often related to differences in the metabolism and disposition of a compound, and an understanding of such differences is extremely important in the safety evaluation of compounds in relation to the extrapolation of toxicity from animals to man and hence risk assessment. 

Hou, W.D., Chen, C., et al., 1999. Study on pesticide residues and safety evaluation for the urban and rural residents diet in Chengdu. Prev. Med. Inform. (Chinese) 5, 77-79. 

Panel on Reproduction report on reproduction studies in the safety evaluation of food additives and pesticide residues. Toxicology and Applied Pharmacology 16 264-296. 

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. 2007. Pesticides Health and safety evaluation of pesticides for carcinogenic potential. Washington, D.C. U.S. EPA. 

IPCS (2002). Antidotes for poisoning by organophosphoras pesticides. Monograph on atropine. International Programme on Chemical Safety Evaluation. World Health Organization, Geneva. 

The Oil of Javanicus was of high purity and passed all toxicity tests It was superior in safety evaluations to conventional plant oils, which always contain very small residual amounts of pesticides, insecticides, and herbicides from the various sprays that are used on such crops. These levels, though, are always below the recommended threshold values laid down by regulatory authorities. Being cultivated in fermenters, M. circinelloides does not, of course, need to be sprayed with any chemical pesticide, herbicide, or fungicide. 

Between 1945 and 1966, the US Department of Agriculture licenced 60 000 individual pesticides at a time when the agency had only one toxicologist on staff, whose job it was to make safety evaluations and judgments based on available health studies (to the extent that any existed) for each of the 60 000 products. 

The initial step in the safety evaluation of a pesticide product is the determination of its acute toxicity (Table I). Laboratory animals, usually rats and rabbits, are exposed to a single dose of the test substance. Toxic effects resulting from ingestion,... 

The National Agricultural Chemical Association (NACA) established a committee to look into groundwater issues in 1983. That committee made recommendations similar to but not identical with the NAS procedures. The NACA committee recommended using the exisiting database within EPA. The database required for pesticides is very extensive (Table I) and provides considerable information upon which to develop a safety evaluation. 

The objective of the safety evaluation of pesticide residues in food is to determine the ADKs of pesticides that will not result in adverse effects at any stage in the human life. span. Since in the majority of cases data on humans arc inadequate to permit such a determination, effects observed in other species must be extrapolated to man. This approach is used to determine the NOAEL from the experimental animal data or, preferably, from data in humans, if available. 

FDA Advisory Committee on Protocols for Safety Evaluations Panel on Reproduction Report on Reproduction Studies in the Safety Evaluation of Food Additives and Pesticide Residues. Toxicol, and Appl. Pharmacol., 1970, 16 264-296. 

What does the future hold Can pesticide metabolism studies and the data they generate be more effectively used in the safety evaluation process Can these studies be made more predictive and thus more toxicologic ally relevant to man It is, of course, difficult if not impossible to foresee the future accurately. We will, however, make a few observations on these and other matters. 

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