Originally published February 23 2006
Senator Boxer criticizes Bush's support of pesticide experimentation on human children
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
The Bush Administration is lending its support to a final draft rule that would allow human pesticide experimentation, but strong opposition has met its efforts, thanks to Senator Barbara Boxer, Rep. Henry A. Waxman and Rep. Hilda L. Solis.
The plan, contained in a final draft rule, was leaked to the legislators by a concerned Administration official who requested that the original copy of the plan not be duplicated in its entirety and widely distributed out of concern for anonymity.
According to the EPA's communications plan, the Administration will officially announce the pesticide experimentation plan later this week as a final regulation.
In August 2005, Congress enacted a moratorium upon EPA using human pesticide experiments until strict ethical standards were established.
The loopholes which allow continued testing on pregnant women, infants and children are contrary to law and widely accepted ethical guidelines, including the Nuremberg code.
The fact that EPA allows pesticide testing of any kind on the most vulnerable, including abused and neglected children, is simply astonishing," said Senator Boxer.
"The regulation is an open invitation to test pesticides on humans, which is the exact opposite of what Congress intended," said Rep. Waxman.
"This is yet another example of the Bush Administration choosing to ignore the letter of the law and going its own way.
Additionally, the plan would allow pesticides to be tested upon pregnant women and children in studies intended for submission at exposure levels up to the current legal limits - even though the National Academy of Sciences found that in some cases this level of exposure could present acute risks to children.
Congress required that EPA establish a Human Subjects Review Board (HSRB) as recommended by the National Academy of Sciences.
This approach would allow an IRB to block unethical research or require modifications suggested by the Human Subjects Review Board prior to the initiation of a study.
While the plan would require researchers to document their ethical compliance in the United States when the plan applies to them, it waives overseas researchers from having to prove a study was ethically conducted - even when the researcher intends to submit the study to EPA.
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