Study: Synthetic Chemicals Not Major Cause of Cancer Human
exposure to carcinogenic pesticides is minuscule compared to the
“background” exposure to carcinogens produced by nature,
according to a new report from two of the nation’s leading
cancer experts. According to Bruce Ames and Lois Swirsky Gold,
authors of a March 1998 study released by the Dallas-based
National Center for Policy Analysis (NCPA), some 99.9 percent of
all pesticides that humans eat are naturally produced by plants
to protect themselves against fungi, insects, and animal
predators. Americans eat about 10,000 times more natural
pesticides per person, per day (measured by weight) than they
consume of synthetic pesticide residues. Ames, a professor at
the University of California at Berkeley, developed the “Ames
test,” used by scientists worldwide to determine whether a
chemical causes mutations and is therefore likely to cause
cancer in laboratory tests. Gold is director of the Carcinogenic
Potency Project at the National Institute of Envir