"Editorial: Farmworkers need pesticide protections", 20 Aug 2014

We support the position of Earthjustice — an environmental watchdog group — that although the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is proposing new regulations to protect farmworkers, including the 114,000 in Florida, more needs to be done to protect them from harmful pesticides. The proposed new standards that recently went through a public comment period, which ended Monday, strengthen existing laws, but as Earthjustice said "don't do an adequate job of protecting the 1 million to 2 million farmworkers in America." The major issue is the pesticides that result in up to 20,000 acute poisonings among agricultural workers every year, according to the federal government. The workers, many making well below poverty level wages, suffer from rashes, blisters, nausea and headaches, as well as an elevated risk of cancer.