Harvest of pain - special report on pesticide poisonings

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Harvest of pain

By Colarossi and Robyn Suriano

Sentinel Staff Writer

May 19, 2002

APOPKA -- Charlie could see the crop-dusters flying low over the

cornfields before anyone else. When the planes were close enough to hear the

throb of their propellers and smell their acrid spray, would pull a

wooden box over his head.

He worked high atop a slow-moving but deliberate piece of farm equipment

called a " mule train " with a team of 25 other workers. Some picked the sweet

corn from Lake Apopka's muck fields. Some packed the corn. built the

boxes to hold the ears.

Those boxes became 's only protection when the crop-dusters swooped

down and showered a chemical spray on his section of field. Others dived

into the corn rows or found shelter under the mule train. Nothing really

worked.

They carried the residue home on their clothes, which had to be washed over

and over again to get rid of the stench. They brought home empty chemical

containers, using gallon-sized jugs for drinking water and larger barrels to

store clothes and food.

, who worked the fields for nearly 30 years until 1991, accepted

daily exposure to pesticides and fertilizers as part of his job.

" When all the spray comes down on you, there ain't nothing you can do. You

get that stuff in your skin, you'll never be right no more, " said ,

who's now 57. " But you got to live; you got to work somewhere. "

can't work anywhere, anymore. He's permanently disabled with

rheumatoid arthritis. He depends on a walker and a wheelchair to get around.

He is among a group of farm workers, their children and residents who grew

up around the farms and now all ask the same question: Did the chemicals

used on the fields make us sick?

The Orlando Sentinel found a variety of illnesses in 50 people tied to the

muck farms, which are now fenced off with signs in some places that warn of

" Danger " and " Hazardous Waste. " The most common problems are rheumatoid

arthritis and lupus, crippling diseases that result when the body attacks

its own tissues. Other complaints include cancers, asthma, respiratory

problems and rashes.

It's not clear whether this number represents a few people -- or a lot. And

it's not clear whether any of their illnesses are related to the fields. All

that's clear is that most of them believe the chemicals used on the farms

could have made them sick.

The last of the farms were closed four years ago, after taxpayers shelled

out $100 million to buy the land and stop the agricultural runoff that

transformed Lake Apopka from a pristine bass-fishing haven into a polluted

stew. In the years since, millions more have been spent to study how farm

chemicals poisoned the lake, deformed its alligators and killed its birds.

But not one penny has gone to look for potential human health hazards,

despite budding scientific evidence linking pesticides to certain diseases.

and others want to know: What about the people?

Prized muck

When farming drove the economy of northwest Orange County, crops wrapped

around the northern shore of Lake Apopka like a fertile crown stretching for

20,000 acres.

Thousands of rows of sweet corn, celery, lettuce, broccoli, carrots and

greens sprouted out of the rich, black muck -- some of the most prized soil

anywhere on Earth. Lake Apopka's muck farmers fed America.

The fields were carved out of marshland, a dense web of shrubbery and water

that is part of the natural cleansing system for the 50-square-mile lake,

one of the largest in Florida. Water from the lake seeped into the marsh,

trickled through its saw grass and eventually filtered back into the lake.

Centuries of decomposing vegetation fortified the wetlands.

This left the marsh with a black soil called muck, which first drew farmers

to the shores of the lake even before the 1900s.

As demand for produce increased by the 1940s, so did the farmers' ability to

harness the land. They created an elaborate infrastructure of levees, canals

and pumps to drain water from the soupy land and make the most of its

precious soil. By the 1990s, 12 major farming companies worked the

north-shore muck, employing 2,000 workers at peak season.

But even the good earth needed help. Farmers relied on regular applications

of pesticides to fight insects and fertilizers to maintain productivity.

At the end of every growing season, the farmers would flood the fields with

lake water, then drain them again before planting the next crop. That

drainage carried traces of chemicals back into the lake, which eventually

became one of the most polluted in Florida.

By the time the state finished buying out the farms, the damage was

extensive. There had been algae blooms, fish kills, sick alligators and

massive bird die-offs in 1998 and 1999 prompting an ongoing federal criminal

investigation.

In a report last June, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service blamed the deaths

of 1,000 birds on pesticides that included DDT, toxaphene and dieldrin. All

three chemicals have been banned or discontinued because of environmental

and health hazards.

'Toxic soup'

Advocates for the farm workers have been trying for years to get scientists

interested in studying health trends they're seeing in the community.

Jeannie Economos used to work for the Apopka office of the Farmworker

Association of Florida during the mid- and late 1990s. She started noticing

health conditions among the workers even before the muck farms closed.

" They were exposed to a toxic soup of many chemicals, " Economos said. " This

issue hasn't been looked at seriously enough to say there are no problems. "

Her successor at the Farmworker Association, Liz Buckley, started making

connections between the environment and farm-worker health early last year

and then began studying the relationships more closely after the U.S. Fish

and Wildlife Service linked pesticides to the bird deaths.

Beyond the farmland, she learned of the two federal Superfund cleanup sites

that sit on opposite ends of the lake, including one on the edge of the muck

blamed for groundwater contamination.

Early on, Buckley began hearing about dozens of cases of heart disease,

asthma, cancer and skin problems in the farm-worker community. She saw

people in their 40s and 50s suffering strokes and multiple heart attacks.

Then, during a community meeting last summer, Buckley heard the first

mention of lupus among farm workers and their families.

" You couldn't write off that situation quite so easily, " she said. " There

was just a lot of confirmation of that. That was the tipping point. "

Bird studies. Alligator studies. Water-quality studies. Buckley thought

someone should study whether the area's environmental contamination was

harming the people.

" You can't just ignore these problems because it's difficult to do the

testing, " she said. " They [pesticides] kill life. They kill insects, but for

us to think they don't have an impact on human life is, I think, a little

bit naive. "

With the help of the Farmworker Association, the Sentinel interviewed people

in the Apopka area with health problems that may be connected to the farms.

More than 70 people were interviewed.

In the end, the reporting documented 20 cases of lupus, 16 cases of

rheumatoid arthritis and one case of the rare autoimmune disorder IGA, or

immunoglobulin antibody deficiency. Those without autoimmune disorders --

more than a dozen -- suffer myriad problems.

Three additional cases of lupus and one case of rheumatoid arthritis have

been identified by the Farmworker Association but not independently

confirmed by the Sentinel.

Most people were found by word of mouth and through the help of the

farm-worker group or the Lupus Foundation of America's office in Apopka.

Some people called in and reported their illnesses after reading a Sentinel

story on the subject last December.

Overall, those on the list range in age from 23 to 70. They were exposed

between the early 1950s and the late 1990s.

Some of the women interviewed also had a history of stillbirths or

miscarriages while working the fields. Many feel strongly that their

illnesses are somehow linked to the farms.

So far, however, neither the medical-research community nor national

farm-worker advocates have taken an interest in the cases. Even if they did,

there is no guarantee of answers. Scientists say it is extremely difficult

to connect pollutants with any given illness.

" In these situations, expectations of the community become very high that

you're going to find a silver bullet, " said Tom Sinks, associate director of

science at the National Center for Environmental Health, a part of the

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. " But history tells us there is

usually no silver bullet. "

Kids played as planes sprayed

Farm workers say they know one thing for certain: They were exposed

routinely to heavy doses of chemicals, many applied from the air.

" When you would go home and take a shower, you could smell the poison come

off your body as soon as the hot water would hit you, " said Geraldean

, a farm worker for 30 years. " It would just bring it out. "

worked in the fields while she was pregnant with two of her

daughters, now in their early 30s. Later, she brought the young girls to the

farms every day because of a lack of affordable day care. Today, both have

lupus.

They weren't the only kids left to romp in the fields while their parents

worked.

" We would chase the airplanes. I used to think it was fun, " said

Whiley, now 37 and suffering from arthritis. " The game was to try to stay in

the mist. "

While pesticides can be applied from the ground, crop-dusting was -- and

still is -- the preferred method because of its efficiency. A good

crop-duster can cover 200 acres in about two hours.

A long list of chemicals was used during the life span of the farms, many of

them discontinued or banned over the years. The combination of chemicals

would make it hard to isolate one source of exposure.

But soon after the state's St. s River Water Management District took

over stewardship of the former farms, the bird deaths occurred. In extensive

soil testing across the farmland, the district found a range of pesticides,

including dieldrin, toxaphene and DDT and its derivatives.

DDT was banned in 1972 because of its threat to wildlife and humans. It is

thought to affect the human nervous system and liver and is suspected of

causing cancer.

Toxaphene, one of the most heavily used insecticides in the country, was

banned in 1990. It is considered a lethal chemical that could damage the

lungs, nervous system and kidneys, according to the Agency for Toxic

Substances and Disease Registry.

Dieldrin was commonly used on corn and cotton crops from the 1950s to 1970,

when the U.S. Department of Agriculture banned it. Moderate exposures could

cause headaches, dizziness and uncontrollable muscle movements. It is a

probable human carcinogen.

The St. s testing found the chemicals dispersed across the farms, most

at levels considered safe for wildlife. But the water district found an

11-acre hot spot containing toxaphene levels 500 times higher than

considered acceptable. That was in 1999, nearly a decade after toxaphene was

banned.

Because the farms no longer exist, it's difficult to obtain detailed

information on how they used pesticides and fertilizers.

Only one former Lake Apopka farming company, A. Duda & Sons Inc., agreed to

discuss the issue in depth. A spokeswoman for the leading national farming

business said the health of company farm workers was always a priority.

" The idea that someone would spray pesticides on anyone to me is

outrageous, " spokeswoman said. " We have always conducted

business in the same manner for 76 years, with integrity. "

But Duda, which employed 320 workers during peak harvest times at Lake

Apopka, did suspect its laborers might be getting exposed to unsafe levels

of pesticides. The company ran blood tests for toxins on farm workers from

the late 1970s to the mid-1980s.

Dr. Larry Beasley, Duda's vice president of technical services, said the

company was looking for high exposure to a class of chemicals known as

organophosphates.

These substances include widely used pesticides such as diazinon and

malathion, as well as the nerve gas sarin. These insecticides work by

disrupting the function of a key enzyme in the nervous system called

cholinesterase, which is present in people as well.

" We felt like it would be the progressive thing for us to do, " Beasley said.

" We made it clear what we were doing, why we were doing it and that it was

for their [the workers'] protection. "

He could not say how many Duda workers were tested or provide the results of

those tests. But some workers were moved to different jobs when they

appeared to show high pesticide exposures, Beasley said.

Ultimately, Duda abandoned the testing because it was proven unreliable.

Exposure to common drugs not found on the farms also could affect the

results and make it look as if workers had high exposures when, in fact,

they did not, Beasley said.

It wasn't until 1994 that the federal Environmental Protection Agency

enacted standards for farm workers that dealt specifically with health and

pesticides. The regulations required the posting of pesticide spray areas in

Spanish and English and the delay of workers' return to treated fields. And

the rules set up decontamination sites where workers could wash off

chemicals.

Hank , president of Long & Farms, which grows corn on sandy soil

near the former muck farms, said he has heard about the farm-workers' health

complaints but doubts the farms were the source of their illnesses.

" I think they're looking for something that's not there, " said.

said he employs people who flew the crop-dusters and mixed the

chemicals at the muck farms, and they show no signs of autoimmune disease.

" These are people that did the applications and had their hands in it [the

chemicals], and they're not the ones complaining, " said.

Her world slowed down

Lee is lying on her couch with her eyes closed. She is not asleep.

Lupus keeps her awake. It lives as an aching pain in her knees and ankles.

She doesn't cry. Silently, she prays for relief.

" It's like my legs are throbbing with a toothache, " Lee said. " I don't sleep

regular. I'm mostly up at night, and I nap during the day. "

The 50-year-old Apopka woman does not leave her home much these days. But

for 27 years, she pulled vegetables from the ground near Lake Apopka. She

packed corn, picked tomatoes and cut cabbage until the dirt covered her

hands like a pair of gloves.

Sometime in the 1980s, she started to feel poorly. Her legs were especially

sore. The sun was so irritating, it made her skin burn intensely.

" I just couldn't do as much, " Lee said. " It was like my whole world was

slowing down. "

It slammed to a stop in 1990, when Lee fell sick enough to be put in the

hospital for a week with kidney problems. She first heard the word lupus

when the doctors stood around her bed one morning and named her pain. She

has lived with it every day since.

" Some days I do pretty good; I can walk a bit, but I never do a whole lot

anymore, " said Lee, who takes 15 medications to treat her lupus and its

complications.

Lupus is among the about 100 conditions lumped into the category of

autoimmune diseases. The disorders stem from the immune system, which

normally acts as the body's defender from bacteria, viruses and other

dangers.

In lupus sufferers, the system has broken down, and the body attacks itself.

The skin, joints and many organs come under assault.

Researchers disagree on how common lupus might be in the population,

offering estimates ranging from 14.6 to 50.8 cases per 100,000 people. The

Lupus Foundation of America estimates that 1.4 million people nationwide

suffer from the disease.

But it's impossible to figure out a rate for the area around Lake Apopka

because there's no way to count every single case of lupus, especially among

highly transient farm workers.

People often suffer from symptoms for years before doctors consider lupus.

Mild cases can be treated with over-the-counter drugs such as ibuprofen,

while more-serious cases require prescription steroids and drugs that

suppress the immune system. The worst cases might be treated with

chemotherapy, which squelches the body's internal attack.

Lupus isn't usually fatal, but serious complications such as kidney failure

or brain infections can bring death.

" I'm dealing with it, you know what I'm saying? " said Lee, who dropped from

230 pounds to 154 after getting sick. " My plan was to work until I was 60 or

65 and then sit down and rest. But I plan one thing, and the Lord plans

another. Now I'm just taking it one day at a time. "

Rheumatoid arthritis can be just as life-altering. Nationwide, it affects

about 2 million people. It occurs when the immune system eats away the

protective capsule surrounding a joint. In advanced stages, the destruction

infiltrates the joint itself, damaging bone and cartilage.

No two people are affected the same. Some suffer mild pain, tenderness and

stiffness but live normally. Others are crippled by pain and inflammation

that confines them to bed.

Betty of Apopka started getting sick while she still worked on the

farms. She ended up wearing elbow braces to ease the pain in her joints and

bagging carrots from a stool. At night, would sit on the side of her

bed, crying and rocking in pain.

Everything hurt: her back, both shoulders, both wrists, both knees.

Rheumatoid arthritis always spreads its destruction in pairs. If the right

elbow is aching, so is the left.

, 48, had to leave the fields altogether by 1994. She retreated to her

bedroom, hobbling out only to get something to eat or use the bathroom.

Fatigue colored everything.

" If I went to the kitchen and put a bowl of soup in the microwave, I was too

tired to eat it, " said , who walks in tender steps, stiff and halting.

Today, manages her disease with an aggressive drug regimen that

includes steroid injections. She is never without pain, though she tries to

defy it. She lives in slow motion.

" I can do just about anything, " she said, " as long as I don't do it too

fast. "

Looking for answers

Doctors think lupus and rheumatoid arthritis, like all autoimmune diseases,

are caused jointly by genetics and environment, said Virginia Ladd,

president and founder of the American Autoimmune Related Diseases

Association.

People are born with a tendency for a certain disease etched into their

genetic makeup. But they do not develop the problem unless they are exposed

to an external trigger, Ladd said.

As yet, scientists cannot say what many of those external factors are. Some

think pesticides could be instigators, and it already has been shown that

certain drugs can trigger lupus.

" If lupus symptoms could be caused by taking medications, I think it's

logical to wonder if they could be caused by other kinds of chemicals, " said

Duane s, a spokesman for the Lupus Foundation of America. The group

opened an office in Apopka to provide services and information in the

community. " I think it's an area that needs more attention. "

It's already caught the eye of epidemiologist Glinda , who studied

cases of lupus in 60 rural counties of North and South Carolina to see

whether the sick had exposure to pesticides. Her work from 1997 to 1999

suggested that people with heavy exposure to pesticides were eight times

more likely to have lupus than other people.

Even so, said, the research does not prove that pesticides can

trigger lupus.

" It's a suggestive link, but it's still very preliminary, " said , who

works at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, a branch

of the National Institutes of Health. " So little work has been done with

pesticides and lupus; it's an angle that needs to be explored. "

Some more work is being done at the University of Florida in Gainesville,

where toxicologist has been doing mouse studies on

pesticides and lupus for four years.

The animals are bred to develop lupus in time, but those exposed to

pesticides get sick more quickly, he said. thinks it's too early,

though, to say whether lupus and pesticides are connected.

" The issue of looking for environmental causes of lupus is fairly recent, "

said. " It's basically something that people have just started

looking for. "

If he can get funding, may join the local Farmworker Association in

a study of the sick people in the Apopka area that would involve taking

blood tests to check for lupus.

In any case, Buckley said, her group intends to conduct its own health

survey of at least 250 former farm workers and Apopka-area residents by

July.

In the only inquiry to date, local health officials examined the lupus

connection to Apopka after the Sentinel ran its first story in December.

They found nothing remarkable.

To do so, they studied hospital discharge records from every hospital in

Florida for people from Apopka, Zellwood and Plymouth who sought treatment

for lupus-related problems. They focused on three specific ZIP codes for the

years 1992-98.

The analysis found that 5.84 out of every 100,000 people discharged from

those regions had been hospitalized for a lupus-related problem. Statewide,

that rate is 5.33 per 100,000. Statistically, the differences do not

indicate that more people in the Apopka area are dealing with lupus.

Bill Toth, an epidemiologist with the Orange County Health Department, said

local health officials are not inclined to look at the problem further.

" I know that doesn't sit well with the population out there, but given the

data we have, I just don't see that it's necessary, " Toth said. " There's

just no real evidence to support that there's anything going on there at

this point. "

But advocates for the farm workers contend that officials will not find

answers with their standard methods. Scientists normally look for

connections between a single toxic substance and one particular health

problem, said King, an activist on environmental health hazards who is

working with the Farmworker Association.

She said such relationships are not so easily discerned when people have

been exposed to a mixture of substances during a long period of time.

Scientists have a much easier time seizing upon the environmental

consequences of chemical pollution but they shy away from the health

aspects, King said.

" Human health is the last frontier; it is the hardest hurdle to overcome and

the one that the government is most afraid of because if they have to admit

someone is sick, " she said, " they have to admit someone is at fault. "

Enduring reminders

This weekend in the tiny hamlet of Zellwood, sitting just across U.S.

Highway 441 from the old farms, they're celebrating the Zellwood Sweet Corn

Festival. Although the corn no longer comes from the muck, the festival is

perhaps the most enduring tribute to the community's agricultural past.

The town's Avenue neighborhood was the childhood home of Buck,

53, and her sister Harriet Stutzman, 55.

They can remember the dust from the fields blowing in the wind and

collecting on their windowsills and doorsteps. They can still recall the

thick chemical odor that hovered in the air where they played.

Both sisters now have lupus.

And over the years, they've learned that their next-door childhood neighbor,

Sharon Willicome, 50, also has lupus. And two other middle-aged women they

know who grew up on their street have rheumatoid arthritis.

They cannot accept the expert conclusions insisting it is very difficult to

prove that an environment scarred by agribusiness had something to do with

their illnesses.

" Almost every female that grew up there in that time period and on that

street, we have all suffered autoimmune disease, " said Willicome, who now

lives in Canada. " It's not a coincidence. Something's strange. "

Just a few miles down the road from Zellwood, Charlie , once a

hulking presence of a man, now spends his days sitting in a big chair in his

small home in Plymouth.

At 57, an age when many men are enjoying an early retirement or even a

second career, shuffles down his hallway, using a walker like

someone in his 80s.

His knees are protruding deformities -- round and painful-looking knobs. His

lower legs are scarred from scratching a persistent rash.

" I used to be a good man, " says. " If I didn't have any health

problems, yeah, I'd still be working. But there's a lot of people that died

behind that spray. That spray will kill you. "

Colarossi can be reached at acolarossi@... or

407-420-6218. Robyn Suriano can be reached at rsuriano@...

or 407-420-5487.

Copyright © 2002, Orlando Sentinel