EPA to hold hearings on possible Atrazine ban

Washington — The U.S. EPA is holding a Scientific Advisory Panel public meeting June 12 to review and consider the ecological risks from the use of the herbicide Atrazine. EPA has announced they are seeking public comments regarding a potential ban of Atrazine in the U.S. The chemical, produced by Swiss agrochemical company Syngenta, has been banned in the European Union since 2004, but 80 million pounds of it are applied in the U.S. each year, primarily on corn, sugar cane, rice, and sorghum, and on golf courses and lawns. Environmental groups, including Save The Frogs, Center for Biological Diversity, and Natural Resources Defense Council, are calling for a federal ban on the use and production of Atrazine, claiming it is a potent endocrine disrupter linked to reproductive defects in fish and frogs and to prostate and breast cancer in laboratory rodents. They also charge that is it extremely persistent in the environment, and that epidemiological studies suggest it is carcinogenic to humans.