Left in the Heartland

A roll call vote in the Senate:

Question: On the Amendment (Boxer Amdt. No. 1023 )
Vote Number: 162 Vote Date: June 29, 2005, 12:49 PM
Required For Majority: 1/2 Vote Result: Amendment Agreed to
Amendment Number: S.Amdt. 1023 to H.R. 2361 (Department of the Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2006 )
Statement of Purpose: To prohibit the use of funds by the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency to accept, consider, or rely on third-party intentional dosing human studies for pesticides or to conduct intentional dosing human studies for pesticides.
Vote Counts: YEAs 60
NAYs 37
Not Voting 3
[snip]
Minnesota: Coleman (R-MN), Nay Dayton (D-MN), Yea

The LA Times reports:

WASHINGTON — The Senate voted Wednesday to bar the Environmental Protection Agency for one year from conducting pesticide tests on humans or using data from such tests.

Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), who proposed the measure as part of the spending bill that funded the EPA, said it would protect children and pregnant women from being exposed to toxins without adequate controls or review.

She said the EPA had been preparing a policy that would permit it to use data from EPA and private studies that tested the effect of pesticides on children.

Boxer said the amendment would restore a ban established during the Clinton administration and retained during President Bush's first term.

What prompted the amendment?

In October 2004, the WaPo reported:

Study of Pesticides and Children Stirs Protests
Staffers Fear EPA Project Endangers Participants

By Juliet Eilperin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, October 30, 2004; Page A02

An Environmental Protection Agency proposal to study young children's exposure to pesticides has sparked a flurry of internal agency protests, with several career officials questioning whether the survey will harm vulnerable infants and toddlers.

The EPA announced this month that it was launching a two-year investigation, partially funded by the American Chemical Council, of how 60 children in Duval County, Fla., absorb pesticides and other household chemicals. The chemical industry funding initially prompted some environmentalists to question whether the study would be biased, and some rank-and-file agency scientists are now questioning whether the plan will exploit financially strapped families.

In exchange for participating for two years in the Children's Environmental Exposure Research Study, which involves infants and children up to age 3, the EPA will give each family using pesticides in their home $970, some children's clothing and a camcorder that parents can keep.

EPA officials in states such as Georgia and Colorado fired off e-mail messages to each other this week suggesting the study lacked safeguards to ensure that low-income families would not be swayed into exposing their children to hazardous chemicals in exchange for money and high-tech gadgetry. Pesticide exposure has been linked to neurological problems, lung damage and birth defects. [read more]