Organic food doesn't prevent cancer...

[siligut]

1. Reducing risk is not the same as prevention

Your subline made the article written by Catharine Paddock PhD sound not only dismissive of the real concern, but simple-minded as well. The real concern is that these pesticides build up in the soil overtime and become concentrated and there is evidence that higher exposure does cause cancer.

According to the National Cancer Institute, pesticides and herbicides used in farming have been linked to a greater overall increase in certain types of cancer in the people who have experienced repeated exposure.

http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/factsheet/Risk/ahs

Most of the cancer research in the AHS has focused on pesticides, which are chemicals used to kill invasive insects, weeds, or small animals. In some cases, relationships between these pesticides and human cancer were examined for the first time in the AHS.

Thus far, researchers have evaluated more than 20 pesticides to determine whether the farmers who use them have increased risks of developing cancer. Some of these analyses have shown that people exposed to certain pesticides have an increased risk of developing certain cancers, but further research is needed to confirm these findings and to evaluate the potential mechanisms by which pesticides might influence cancer risk.

For example, a study from the AHS reported in 2009 that people who use the weed killer imazethapyr have increased risks of bladder cancer and colon cancer. Imazethapyr is in a class of chemicals known as aromatic amines. It was first used in the United States in 1989, and, since then, has been one of the most commonly used herbicides for killing weeds in soybean, dry bean, alfalfa, and other crop fields.