Research Blog

Pesticides and Cancer are Coincidentally Ubiquitous

Pesticides, including herbicides, fungicides, and insecticides, are associated with severe adverse effects, including neurological dysfunction, Parkinson’s disease, immune dysfunction, and cancer.

Pesticide exposure is often associated with a “cocktail” of pesticides, not just a single compound, and “off-target” pesticide drift. Research suggests that pesticides may increase cancer risk at a rate comparable to smoking.

Agricultural pesticides are associated with several cancers, including:

Bladder
Colon
Leukemia
Lung
Non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma
Pancreatic

A comprehensive population-based study reviewed exposure to 69 pesticides and associated cancer rates in 3,143 counties in the U.S. The study evaluated pesticide use patterns nationwide, considering potential confounders, including smoking rates, socioeconomic status, and agricultural land use. Ultimately, increased pesticide exposure was associated with an increased risk of all cancers studied.

The study revealed that:

Atrazine was consistently a top contributor in regions with high added risk for all cancers and colon cancers.
Boscalid was a top contributor in not only high-added-risk regions for leukemia, non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, and pancreatic cancer but also for low-added-risk regions of lung cancer.
Dimethomorph was representative of not only regions with a high added risk of leukemia and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma but also regions with a low added risk of colon cancer.
Dicamba was consistently at the top of the list in regions with a high added risk of colon cancer and pancreatic cancer.
Dimethenamid was seen in regions with a low added risk of bladder cancer, but in combination with dimethenamid-P, it was observed in regions with a high added risk of pancreatic cancer.
Dinotefuran was at the top in regions with high leukemia and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma on the opposite end for colon cancer.
Glyphosate was consistently seen at the top in regions with a high added risk of all cancers, colon cancer, and pancreatic cancer.
Imazethapyr had a similar presence in all cancers, colon cancer, and lung cancer.
Metolachlor, metolachlor-S, and the combination of both were consistently top contributors for regions with higher added risk of all cancers, colon cancer, and pancreatic cancer.
These findings suggest that added cancer risk is dependent on cancer type with common pesticides associated with several cancer types.

Additional cancer cases in a single year that can be attributed to differences in agricultural pesticide use patterns.

These patterns of use were defined by latent class analysis; estimates were derived from generalized linear models adjusted for agricultural land use, total population, the Social Vulnerability Index, and smoking rates. This plot contrasts the counties that have the least risky use of agricultural pesticides with the counties that have the riskiest use of agricultural pesticides.

Additional cancer cases per cancer type in a single year that can be attributed to differences in agricultural pesticide pattern use.

In summary:

Agricultural pesticide use has a significant impact on all the cancer types evaluated in this study
All cancers, bladder cancer, colon cancer, leukemia, lung cancer, non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, and pancreatic cancer)
These associations are more evident in regions with heavy agricultural productivity.
Pesticide-associated cancers appear to be on par with several smoking-associated cancer types.
This is the first study that presents comprehensive estimates for cases that are exclusively attributable to agricultural pesticide use.

Reference

Gerken, Jacob, et al. "Comprehensive assessment of pesticide use patterns and increased cancer risk." Frontiers in Cancer Control and Society 2 (2024): 1368086. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY).

Tag(s): Conditions