by Kathleen Summers

NOTE: This article expresses my personal opinions and not necessarily those of the Churchill Community Foundation or any of its members.

Spring will soon be upon us, and the flowers will be blooming again. Some of them will be the “good” flowers— tulips, daffodils, and garden roses. Others will be the “bad” flowers—dandelions, daisies, and other unwanted weeds that run amok… We also look forward to the “good” bugs, like butterflies and ladybugs, while waging war on the “bad” ones, like beetles and ants. Time to get out the lawn sprays and chemicals.

But wait… Which is really more harmful to our overall well-being— the bright yellow dandelion, or the mists of chemicals that we spray upon these unwanted blooms? As I sat in my veterinariany oncologist’s waiting room week after week for more than a year, trying to save my dog from Stage Four Lymphoma, this question floated through my mind with increasing frequency. My dog’s oncologist had told me that the type of cancer that affected her, and dozens of other dogs in the waiting room (not to mention several human beings I have known), has been linked to lawn chemicals—herbicides. Are we killing our pets, and maybe even ourselves, just to stamp out unwanted flowers?

And it’s not just our dogs. Childhood cancer rates have been increasing over the past 20 years, and some of the increases have been linked, at least in part, to pesticide exposure. Parkinson’s Disease is also on the rise, and has been linked, in many studies, to pesticide use. Again, are we killing our kids, and ourselves, just to stamp out ants and spiders?

Consider these findings…

• A study published in 1999 in the Journal of the American Cancer Society showed a strong link between the world’s most commonly-used herbicide (glyposate, an ingredient in products like Roundup) and non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.
• The Pesticide Education Center (www.pesticides.org) has compiled a collection of more than fifty studies demonstrating a link between childhood cancer and pesticide exposure.
• Federally-sponsored studies tracked farmers in several states who used pesticides regularly. It found that they had higher than normal rates of several types of cancer.
• The Journal of the National Cancer Institute reported in 1991 that pet dogs exposed to the weed killer 2,4-D are dying of cancer at twice the normal rates. 2,4-D is an ingredient in many popular over-the-counter weed killers.
• Over 40 studies have found a link between pesticide exposure and Parkinson’s Disease, as well as many other devastating neurological impairments (report available at www.pesticides.org).
• More than 380 studies over the past 35 years have linked many types of cancer in adults to pesticide exposure in the home, work, and environment (www.pesticides.org).

I no longer spend so many afternoons in the vet’s office. My dog died of cancer last year at an early age. Now I have more time to spend with my mother, who is suffering from her tenth year with Parkinson’s Disease—which has also been linked to lawn chemicals.

Perhaps we need to rethink our priorities here. I’d rather have ants and weeds in my rose garden than Parkinson’s and cancer in my family tree.