EPA Approves Pesticide With DDT : Says Use of Dicofol May Continue if Toxin Level Is Reduced

The Environmental Protection Agency announced Thursday that a pesticide widely used in California, linked to human health problems and blamed for the loss of birds now near extinction, may continue to be sold if it is reformulated to reduce its most harmful poison.

The pesticide, dicofol, contains DDT, a toxin and suspected carcinogen banned in the United States since 1972.

Environmentalists said the agency’s decision not to ban dicofol outright will result in widespread harm to wildlife and possibly to humans. Federal biologists conceded that the action will slow recovery of several endangered birds, including the bald eagle.

‘Just Appalling’

“It’s appalling, just appalling,” said Ellen Silbergeld, a toxicologist with the Environmental Defense Fund, a research group. “The thing that really makes me sad is that DDT and its related compounds are among those chemicals that got so widespread that they still show up in human tissue samples and even in mother’s milk.

“We were just beginning to see a decrease in those concentrations. This is so ignorant, such an ignorant thing to do.”

Silbergeld said the group may sue the agency in an effort to block the order. She said DDT and its derivatives are suspected of interfering with reproduction in humans and may cause stillbirths and spontaneous abortions. She cited studies from India, England and the National Institute of Environmental Health.

But an EPA spokesman said the agency has no evidence linking the pesticide to human reproductive failure and that, at the levels proposed, it will not harm human health. Nevertheless, the agency will require that loaders and applicators of the pesticide be warned of possible dangers and advised to wear protective gloves when handling it. “The primary effect is on wildlife,” the spokesman said.

No Substitutes

Assistant EPA Administrator Jack Moore said the agency decided not to ban the pesticide outright because there are no good substitutes available. He said the only significant harm dicofol will pose at the new reduced levels of DDT will be to the peregrine falcon, an endangered bird that federal biologists warned might not survive the phased-in reductions.

As a result, the manufacturers of dicofol will be required to pay $325,000 to a California rescue program for the bird, the Santa Cruz Predatory Bird Research Group, which will replace the falcon eggs in nests with dummy eggs, hatch the real eggs in incubators and return the young birds to the nests.

DDT causes birds to lay eggs with such thin shells that they crack when the parents sit on them--a problem for several endangered birds, including the California condor. In the state’s central coastal region, peregrine falcons are no longer able to raise their young in the wild.

Ban Proposed in 1984

The EPA proposed banning dicofol in 1984 and environmentalists charged Thursday that the agency changed its mind after intense lobbying by the manufacturers. The agency did not even begin to study dicofol until 1983, nine years after DDT was banned.

The EPA’s Moore, speaking at a news conference, was at a loss to explain why the agency did not decide earlier to reduce the DDT-related levels in dicofol, which has been used since the 1950s. He speculated that the agency’s failure to deal with the problem might be the result of a “complete oversight” or something that “slipped through the cracks.”

Under the agency’s order, which is subject to public comment for 30 days, the DDT levels will be reduced in two stages. Manufacturers must immediately reduce DDT and its derivatives to 2.5% of the substances and, by Dec. 31, 1988, to less than 0.1%. Moore said the level found in the pesticide now is between 2.5% and 5% but was as high as 10% in 1983.

Used to Kill Mites

Dicofol is used to destroy mites, primarily in cotton and citrus. Nearly 3 million pounds of the pesticide is used each year, mostly in California’s San Joaquin Valley, and in Arizona, Texa1931501934substitutes are unsatisfactory because they are likely to kill insects beneficial to the crops.

The chemical works its way up the food chain, from insects and fish to birds. Fish, in addition to birds, lose their ability to reproduce. Peregrine falcons are contaminated by eating smaller birds, bald eagles by eating fish.

Jack Pounds, a spokesman for Philadelphia-based Rohm & Haas Co., the major manufacturer of dicofol, said the company already meets the 2.5% standards and will build a $20-million plant to reformulate the pesticide to reduce DDT further.

But he said the company does not believe the product causes any harm to the environment and maintained that its loss would force farmers to use other pesticides that in combination would cause more environmental damage. He said the product protects $1 billion in crops a year, including $800 million in cotton and citrus.