Getting America’s Lawns Off Drugs

Jason Phillip — Wed, 05 Mar 2008 20:35:00 +0000

Last week I wrote about how the Chicago nonprofit Safer Pest Control Project has been working to protect people from the harmful effects of toxic pesticides. In talking with the organization’s Executive Director, Rachel Rosenberg, I learned about how common it is for people to be exposed to chemical pesticides in public places without being aware, and how dangerous this can be for children.

But even more insidious than the harm posed by toxins used to rid our homes and workplaces of unwanted critters is the problem of chemical pesticides used to control outdoor pests. In fact, the use of chemicals to kill animals and plants in our yards is a lot more widespread than you may have guessed. Consider these statistics cited by the Safer Pest Control Project:

78 million households in the U.S. use home and garden pesticides.
$700 million are spent annually on pesticides for U.S. lawns.
67 million pounds of synthetic pesticides are used on U.S. lawns each year.
Three times as much pesticide is used on lawn per acre than on agricultural crops.

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Getting America’s Lawns Off Drugs