Tuesday, May 25, 2010

Pesticides Now Strongly Linked To ADHD. Thus, What Can We Expect From The Oil Disperants Used In The Gulf Of Mexico?


Can't sit still or focus? How about your significant other, BFF, or child? In some of these cases, pesticides in the food, house, yard, and elsewhere might be the culprit.

In a recent U.S. study, "researchers tracked the pesticides' breakdown products in children's urine and found those with high levels were almost twice as likely to develop ADHD as those with undetectable levels."

This shouldn't be a surprise since pesticides and many chemicals are toxic to the nervous system. When you add in the problems from processed foods, it's like the odds for being healthy and normal is stacked against us.

Maybe you've noticed like have that ADHD (Attention Deficient Hyperactivity Disorder) is a miserable condition, both for the person who has it and the ones who have to live with them or work with.

They can be fun at times since they're so spontaneous, but can also drive you nuts because they're often forgetful, speak and act before thinking, and are more accident prone. Impulsiveness tends to impair judgment.

They get bored easily. The temper tantrums of quite a few of these kids are unforgettable, although not all have that problem. Except for the most determined or the brightest, many do not finish school, so their ability to get or keep jobs are diminished.

Special education classes, the juvenile system and the jails are filled with kids and adults with ADHD, not necessarily because they're stupid, but because they can't concentrate, and get into all kinds of trouble. In the UK, 20% of kids suspended from school have the disorder. A quarter to 67% of inmates are thought to have ADHD.

Girls and women with ADHD may not be as antsy in general, but they're less likely to do well in school or go to college. More of them have eating disorders and serious weight problems. Sounds like a lot of young white women I see and know who were working for slave wages long before the economy crashed. Whether this is the result of a lifelong diet of processed foods, ADHD, both, or not being ambitious is anyone's guess. Black women too, but we also have the deck of discrimination stacked against us.

This new info about the link between pesticides and ADHD makes me wonder how the toxic chemicals that are unnecessarily and currently being dumped into the Gulf of Mexico will affect even more unborn and young children.

On the other hand, in the long term, maybe it won't even matter. I've been researching oil dispersants day and night. What I have learned is grim, so grim that I haven't been able to pull it together to write more about this cataclysmic event going on, and how the problem is being compounded by the usual suspects.

Meanwhile, I consider my ADHD and mood disordered son. I shake my head in sorrow, thinking of the possibility for so many more damaged people like him in the next generation...


6 comments:

  1. Sometimes, "Better Living Through Science" isn't.

    ReplyDelete
  2. John, Yeah, I agree. Science without wisdom is devastating us, our communities, and the environment on a massive scale. Makes me sad.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I found this post from The Daily Dish. My son is ten and has mild ADHD but it doesn't run in the family. We used those roach bombs in an apartment for years, and flea treatments on the dog. I read your linked post about the dangers of processed foods. We eat too much of that too. Things are so messed up out here. It's just sad.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Kit are we really surprised that stuff used to KILL a living thing could do damage to the human body especially that of little kids?

    Kit while reading the article...I'm wondering if all those years of having my home sprayed with chemicals and pesticides...didn't affect/effect my son in some way.

    So much stuff in the world today is making our kids sicker and sicker but yet it still continues on. I am so tired of all the food dyes (which cause ADHD problems) and chemicals and hormones in the food.

    Kit great article!!

    ReplyDelete
  5. This reminds me somewhat of malathion being sprayed from helicopters in LA back in the 80's to kill fruitflies. People hated having that poison sprayed down on us, but we were pretty helpless. I recall seeing the helicopters in the evening, all lit up and headed our way. Nothing good comes out of pesticides and these weird chemicals.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Oso, I remember this happening my area too, I think to combat West Nile.

    JJ Brock, It's possible. :(

    Georgette, Welcome, and thanks for leaving a comment. Sorry to hear this, but thankfully your kid's ADHD is mild. Who knows, it might be diet related, as you suggested.

    Speaking of diet, readers, be sure to wash well fruits and vegetables, and seafood from the Gulf at this point? I personally wouldn't trust it for at least a decade because of the dispersants. Really blows me.

    ReplyDelete

Hi, this is Kit.

I haven't posted since summer 2010, and comment moderation has been on for a very long time.

My old blogger friends (you know who you are) are welcome to email me.

I can be reached at:
kitsmailbag@gmail.com.