Countywide : Earth Day Speaker Critical of Spraying

Aerial spraying for the Mediterranean fruit fly represents one of the most serious environmental and health threats to Orange County, a leading foe of malathion spraying said at Earth Day festivities Wednesday at Orange Coast College.

“It’s insane to conduct a massive experiment with so many people as guinea pigs,” said Phil Cutler, an Orange Coast College electronics instructor and member of Orange County Citizens Against Malathion Spraying. “Are we nutty enough to stay on this pesticide treadmill?”

Appearing before a crowd of about 100 people, Cutler attacked state officials for spraying malathion over residential areas without properly assessing whether the chemical is safe. He accused the state of being deceptive and inept in handling the Medfly eradication effort.

State agricultural officials who run the operation have long contended that malathion, in the doses used for aerial spraying, does not pose a health risk and use medical studies from both the state Department of Health Services and the Environmental Protection Agency to prove their case.

Without spraying, officials predict, the Medfly could cause millions of dollars in damage to California’s large agricultural industry.

The California Medical Assn. last month overwhelmingly rejected a resolution that called for a halt to the spraying, with many members saying the pesticide is safe.

Such assurances do not satisfy Cutler.

“Asbestos, radon, Agent Orange--they are all examples of the same narrow-mindedness,” he said. “They’ve found (negative) effects 30 or 40 years after (the exposure). What are they going to find out about the spraying?”

Cutler said he fears that the pesticide is killing “friendly bugs,” such as bees and ladybugs, that help the environment. He also said that agricultural and pesticide interests are behind the push for spraying when other ways of controlling the Medfly--such as the use of sterile flies to break the breeding cycle--are available.

Wednesday’s speech was one of a week’s worth of events at the college designed to focus attention on the environment.