IN A NEW study suggesting pesticides may be linked with the health and development of children, researchers report that prenatal exposure to organophosphate (OP) pesticides—widely used on food crops—is related to lower intelligence scores at age 7 years (Bouchard et al., 2011). The researchers found that every 10-fold increase in measures of OPs detected during a mother's pregnancy corresponded to a 5.5-point drop in overall IQ scores in 7-year-old children. Children with the highest levels of prenatal pesticide exposure scored 7 points lower on a standardized measure of intelligence compared with children who had the lowest levels of exposures. According to the researchers, this association is substantial, especially when viewed at a population level, with the difference resulting in more children being shifted into the lower end of the spectrum of learning and more children needing special services at school.
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