NEWS DAY | Atrazine on Halloween

A Minnesota review of atrazine safety by the Minnesota Department of Agriculture, the state’s Department of Health, and the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency is due out around Halloween, according to MinnPost. That’s a few weeks after the feds announced the beginning of a major review of the controversial pesticide.

In MinnPost, Will Souder explains:

Atrazine was first licensed in the United States in 1958, and for many years was the most heavily used pesticide in the world. It has also been one of the most frequently detected contaminants of water. Atrazine and its breakdown compounds have been found in lakes, streams, reservoirs, clouds, rain, snow, fog, and in water ready for human consumption from drinking-water systems in agricultural areas. …
The new EPA review follows media accounts of inadequate monitoring and regulation of community water systems and a damning report by the Natural Resources Defense Council (NDRC) last August that accused the agency of ignoring atrazine contamination in drinking water and in natural watersheds across the Midwest.

The European Union banned use of atrazine in 2003. Critics point to its persistence in drinking water and to spikes in atrazine presence in drinking water that are not measured well. They also argue that, whether or not atrazine is carcinogenic, it is linked ot various other problems, has been shown to cause deformities in frogs, and is an endocrine disruptor.

News with attitude, mostly from MN but with occasional forays abroad. News Day summarizes, links to, and comments on reports from news media around the world, with particular attention to Minnesota news.

Mary Turck

Mary Tuck is the editor of the TC Daily Planet.