What is the correlation between pesticides and autism?

Living in Southern California and in one

of the biggest farming communities in the state you will see why I bring this up. Many of our youth from
our hard-working farming communities have been diagnosis with a disability and in this case autism. To
gain a better knowledge of this question we have to understand what autism is and who it affects.
Autism Spectrum Disorder (ADS) for short is a developmental disability caused by differences in the
brain. Some people with ASD have a known difference, such as a genetic condition. (Centers for Disease
and Control Prevention) Autism is diagnosed at a fairly young age and can be noticed from children as
young as 2. By the time they hot 5 they can be diagnosed with autism as the signs would be more
noticeable. Some of the signs and symptoms include not being to socialize or interact with others, and
they have a different way of learning. Its hard to imagine farming without pesticides, but the only true
way of seeing these numbers go down is by cutting pesticides that can cause us disabilities.

Autism is here to stay and is not going anywhere so if we can try and understand the correlation
than maybe we can help bring this number down. A study done from 1990-2001 on children up to 5
years showed a 600% increase in autism in California from previous years. (Hertz-Picciotto and Delwiche
2009) A few case studies done from different pesticides could show a difference on how it affected the
child post birth. In one case study mothers who had been exposed to organochlorine (OC) insecticides
that were applied within 500 meters of the home between pregnancy days 26 and 81 were 7.6 times
more likely to be diagnosed with ASD than the children of mothers who lived in the lowest exposure
quartile. A secondary case study was done to see if pregnant women in the central coast were exposed
to pesticides. Turns out that just by walking 83% of the women tested had some sort of pesticide in their
urine. (Woodruff et al. 2011). As you can see the quantitative studied examined multiple women in a
controlled and selective process. The controlled environment was living in a farming community and the
selective process of pregnant women from the middle of there first trimester to mid third trimester. I
think the approaches that where taking to try and find a correlation went a long way with providing
information that pregnant women in areas that have a lot of pesticides can in fact increase autism in
there future children.

As we continue to age this problem is not going to go away. The more cases we study and take
time to understand maybe we could prevent autism from happening around the farm working
communities. The process by which each case study was done shows that they wanted to target a
certain person to get the most accurate results. Even though the numbers are low compared to what I
originally thought, doesn’t exclude the fact that this is a problem that is only going to continue growing.
As a community, county, state, and nation we need to be doing more to protecting our mothers, and
future children so they have the same opportunities and joys like every other child

Konkel, L. (2014, June 23). Autism risk higher near pesticide-treated fields. Scientific American. Retrieved
December 9, 2022, from https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/autism-risk-higher-near-pesticide-
treated-fields/
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2022, December 9). What is autism spectrum disorder? Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention. Retrieved December 9, 2022, from
https://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/autism/facts.html

Hertz-Picciotto I, Schmidt R and Krakowiak P (2018) Understanding environmental contributions to autism: Causal
concepts and the state of science, Autism Research, 10.1002/aur.1938, 11:4, (554-586), Online publication
date: 1-Apr-2018.

Roberts EM, English PB, Grether JK, Windham GC, Somberg L, Wolff C. 2007. Maternal residence near agricultural
pesticide applications and autism spectrum disorders among children in the California Central Valley.

Woodruff TJ, Zota AR, Schwartz JM. 2011. Environmental chemicals in pregnant women in the United States:
NHANES 2003–2004.Environ Health Perspect