Denmark: Farmers' use of PFAS pesticides can be a ticking time bomb

There are more than 7 million PFAS and over 21 million fluorinated compounds listed in PubChem (2023).
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Denmark: Farmers' use of PFAS pesticides can be a ticking time bomb

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Farmers' use of PFAS pesticides can be a ticking time bomb

Danish farmers legally spray PFAS pesticides on their fields. Professionals fear the consequences.

NYHeder - February 9, 2023 (Translated by Google)

In the past ten years, Danish farmers have sprayed hundreds of thousands of kilos of PFAS over their fields.

It is an "environmental bomb that threatens Danes' drinking water", warn several experts. It is PFAS pesticides that the farmers spray with - and it is legal.

This is written by the trade magazine Ingeniøren.

An estimate that the Engineer has made on the basis of figures from the Middeldatabase and the Danish Environmental Protection Agency's control statistics shows that almost 500,000 kilos of diflufenican and fluopyram were sold on the Danish market in the period 2010-2020.

These are the two most widespread active substances in PFAS pesticides. And that is almost a tenfold increase.

- It is very problematic, says Xenia Trier, lecturer in analytical environmental chemistry at the University of Copenhagen to Ingeniøren.

She points out that it is not currently known how big a threat PFAS pesticides and their breakdown products pose to the environment and humans. This remains to be investigated.

There is cause for concern because the substances can accumulate and become a major problem.

- It is a really bad idea to spread them directly into the environment, where the levels will continue to rise, so that at some point they are found in quantities harmful to health, says Xenia Trier.

Also Søren Rygaard Lenschow, civil engineer and senior specialist at the consulting engineering company Niras, warns of a "potential growing PFAS pollution" caused by the large consumption of PFAS pesticides.

- The authorities must take this seriously.

- It is important that this group of pesticides is evaluated. If necessary, the approvals must be revoked so that the use ceases, he tells the Engineer.

However, the Danish Environmental Protection Agency assesses that PFAS pesticides are not a threat to the groundwater we use for drinking water in Denmark.

This is because the EU's pesticide regulation obliges manufacturers to document which active substances are included in their pesticides.

Against this background, the Danish Environmental Protection Agency has made an overall assessment and approved the pesticide products because it is safe in relation to health and the environment - and the groundwater.

Søren Rygaard Lenschow points out, however, that mistakes have been made in the past.

For example, the insecticide DDT was declared harmless to humans. But it is now considered one of the most dangerous chemicals ever created by man.

Therefore, he clearly calls for studies to be carried out on how PFAS pesticides are broken down and whether they are leached into the groundwater.

SOURCE:
https://nyheder.dk/landmaends-brug-af-p ... nde-bombe/

Bayer US & Diflufenican - Press Release 2021:
https://www.bayer.com/en/us/diflufenican

Fluopyram & Thyroid

Rouquié D, Tinwell H, Blanck O, Schorsch F, Geter D, Wason S, Bars R - "Thyroid tumor formation in the male mouse induced by fluopyram is mediated by activation of hepatic CAR/PXR nuclear receptors" Regul Toxicol Pharmaco 70(3):673-80 (2014) doi: 10.1016/j.yrtph.2014.10.003
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/a ... 0014002220
"The proposed MOA consists of an initial effect on the liver by activating the constitutive androstane (Car) and pregnane X (Pxr) nuclear receptors causing increased elimination of thyroid hormones followed by an increased secretion of thyroid stimulating hormone (TSH). This change in TSH secretion results in an increase of TFC proliferation which leads to hyperplasia and eventually adenomas after chronic exposure."
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