Fwd: A state agency's study found that Hispanic farmworkers have higher rates...

[Guest guest]

FYI

TO: EJ contacts

RE: Farmworker health

__________________

Hispanic farmworkers more likely to have cancer

March 18, 2002 Posted: 4:37 PM EST (2137 GMT)

FRESNO, California (AP) -- A

state agency's study found that

Hispanic farmworkers have

higher rates of brain, leukemia,

skin and stomach cancers than

other Hispanics in California,

a phenomenon their union

blames on pesticide exposure.

Female Hispanic farmworkers

also had more cases of uterine

cancer than the rest of the state's

Hispanic women, according to

the Cancer Registry of California

study, " Cancer Incidence in the

United Farm Workers of

America, 19 87-1997. "

The study, published in the November issue of the American

Journal of Industrial Medicine, doesn't directly link

pesticide use

to the higher rates of cancer.

Another study will examine what pesticides were used and

how

long farmworkers were exposed to them, said Mills,

the

study's author and cancer epidemiologist at the Cancer

Registry.

But the UFW believes there is a direct relationship

between the

chemicals and cancer, said Doug Blaylock, the union's

medical

plan administrator.

Bob Krauter, California Farm Bureau Federation spokesman,

said

that without discounting for family histories and

lifestyles, there's

no way to prove a direct link.

" Just because workers work in an agricultural setting

where

pesticides were used, they say, 'We're attributing this to

pesticides.' I just don't see the connection there, " he

said.

ph Wiemels, a cancer epidemiologist at the University

of

California at San Francisco, cautioned that with general

population studies like the registry study, " there are so

many

opportunities for bias because you're roughly putting data

together. "

The registry used data from 146,581 farmworkers who had

been

members of the union from 1973 to 1997 and compared it

with

the state's general Hispanic population.

It found that out of more than 140,000 farmworkers, 1,001

had

been diagnosed with cancer from 1973 into 1997, and that

there

were 59 percent more reports of leukemia and 69 percent

more

reports of stomach cancers than there were in California's

general

Hispanic population.

The study found fewer incidents of breast and colon cancer

among the farmworkers than there were in the state's

general

Hispanic population, but did not offer an explanation for

the

finding.

Mills said the study's results show the lack of health

care and

education available to the farmworkers.

The farmworkers were diagnosed at a later stage than most

of the

state's Latinos, according to the study. Many cancers,

such as

uterine cancer, are more treatable with early detection,

Mills said.

, 66, who spent 40 years spraying chemicals

on

vineyards and citrus orchards in the Imperial Valley,

blames the

pesticides for his leukemia.

Employers provided workers with gloves and masks, but

said it was often too hot to wear them. Temperatures often

rise

above 100 degrees where he worked near Palm Springs.

Krauter noted that rates of pesticide injuries and illness

have

declined in the past 20 years. In 2000, the state

Department of

Pesticide Regulation recorded 893 incidents, down 1,201

from

1999, according to a recent report.

____________________

Kirk, Esq.

Special Counsel to the Director

Regional Title VI Coordinator

Office for Civil Rights and Environmental Justice (OCREJ)

U.S. EPA, Region 10

811 SW 6th Avenue

Portland, OR 97204

phone 503.326.3269

fax 503.326.3399

kirk.monica@...