This committee should include representatives of consumers, growers, processers, and farm workers; biostatisticians, computer programmers, and other experts in research design and data processing; behavioral scientists with a specialty in the "culture of poverty" and Hispanic cultures; biochemists, physiologists, safety engineers, industrial hygienists, pathologists; representatives of the Departments of Agriculture, Public Health, and Industrial Relations. Representatives of agricultural chemical manufacturers might attend, ex officio, in accordance with our earlier comments about the desirability of openness, but no one should be entitled to a vote on any matter in which he had a financial conflict of interest.

10. Underlying all else, there is something we can only describe as a research attitude. This is a subtle matter, difficult if not impossible to spell out in a written set of standards. And yet we cannot close without mentioning it.

If a researcher has a feeling for human dignity, he will, without guidance, simply because of the kind of person he is, not only honor every letter of any code of research ethics which might be devised, but he will honor their spirit, too. He will fill the interstices--enrich and vivify them in a hundred ways which cannot be spelled out in the written word. On the other hand, if a person lacks this sense, no set of standards will suffice. He will betray their spirit by his tone of voice and a hundred gestures which are unconscious and which he therefore cannot control. There is a special danger that the latter sort of attitude may creep into and compromise research involving agricultural workers. There is a real danger that any of us, no matter how worthy our intentions, may not be able to conceive farm laborers in the way which the highest research ethics presuppose. Because of the whole weight of history of Western man, and the history of California agriculture in particular, it is very difficult for white, Anglo-Saxon, urban, nonfarm workers not to regard Mexican farm workers as significantly different from themselves. They "look a little different"; they tend to live in a different part of town; they speak a different language and there is a metaphorical as well as literal meaning in that expression. It is easy for most persons, subconsciously, to slip into assumptions which are, at best, patronizing, and all too often much worse than patronizing: that they do not get tired as we do; that they are not as sensitive to pain; that even if we tried to explain a scientific concept, they wouldn't understand it; etc.

No one who harbors even the hint of such attitudes is fit to have any part in research dealing with agricultural workers. If we had to telescope all the points we have tried to make in this presentation-if we had to express in a single sentence the soul of the ethics of research involving human beings-we would do so in this way the researcher must be able to conceive his subjects as extensions of himself.

Difficult as it may be to find such scientific humanists or, if you prefer, humanistic scientists-nothing less will suffice to clear the air of present misunderstandings, resentments, confusions, hostilities, and usher in the kind of research that is necessary to establish, once and for all, the terms under which agricultural chemicals may be used for the benefit of mankind-at-large without jeopardizing any fraction of mankind in the process.

Senator ALLEN. Mr. Krebs, I appreciate your appearance before the subcommittee and giving us the benefit of your views. I notice that you recommend that all pesticides that are now registered be recalled, retested, and that there be a recertification.

Mr. KREBS. In a reasonable amount of time.

Senator ALLEN. To make sure that they are not dangerous for workers. I believe there are some 60,000 pesticides registered at present. To retest all of these would be a tremendous job, would it not?

Mr. KREBS. It would, Mr. Chairman, but for decades and probably centuries, the farmworker has been the low man on the totem pole. I know of no other industry where public health is involved that can get away with the things the pesticide industry does concerning the safety of the farmworker. We can't say even to the exact number how many farmworkers have been injured because we have no adequate reporting methods for these things. Farmworkers themselves often don't know that they are being poisoned; they think it is part of their

work in the field. It seems to me when we have an opportunity with a control act like this, that now is the time to start making a few amends.

Senator ALLEN. Would you withdraw them all at once?

Mr. KREBS. As I said, in the testimony, within a reasonable length of time. I think there are some that are very innocuous but there are others that where there is reasonable suspicion of causing serious poisoning. Those should be given priority. But, for instance, in the California poisoning cases that occasioned these tests that I talked about in my testimony, they found what they thought for a long time were innocuous poisons were not when used in combination with some other poisons. They were no longer innocuous; they became quite serious. So, we just don't know. I think it should be the responsibility of the manufacturers of these pesticides before they bring them out to make sure they are safe.

Senator ALLEN. Well, now, right at this point. how could a pesticide be safe, as you say, and still have the requisite qualities for being a pesticide? In other words, is it not the improper use of a pesticide that would make it unsafe for farmworkers rather than the qualities of the compound itself?

Mr. KREBS. Well, I think that raises a more fundamental question, Senator. You know there is quite a school of thought about the way pesticides have been used in this country. Dr. Robert Van Den Bosch, prominent University of California enthomologist says that "fundamentally, pest control as it is now practiced *** is essentially not an ecological matter it is largely a matter of merchandising. In essence, we are using the wrong kinds of material in the wrong places at wrong times in excessive amounts, and engendering problems which increases the use of these materials, adds to the pollution problem, adds to the cost of agricultural pest control, and adds to what you might describe as the concern of the general public." I think the integrated approach (chemical and biological) to pest control should be given a lot more time and a lot more study by those that are in a position to do so.

Senator ALLEN. I know, but if you are going to require that the compounds or pesticides be safe, won't that rob it of its potency to do the job that it is supposed to do? I mean, it's the improper use by the worker that would make it unsafe for him and not the qualities of the compound.

Mr. KREBS. If that is the case, and I am not so sure that pesticides cannot be developed that are safe and also are helpful to the farmers, then they should at least be tested so that the people that are handling them are safe. Certainly the people that handle both pesticides and chemicals in the companies that manufacture them go through a rigid set of safety standards. I see no reason why the men and women that handle those pesticides day in day out should not come under that same criteria.

For example, at the University of California, in the last 3 years, chemical manufacturers have given the university some $600,000 to do research on pesticides. Out of that $600,000, only $20,000 has been clearly marked, and that was given in December of last year, for tests for farmworkers' safety.

Senator ALLEN. Thank you very much.

(The exhibits attached to Mr. Kreb's statement are as follows:)

EXHIBIT A

AGRIBUSINESS ACCOUNTABILITY PROJECT DEPLORES TESTING OF DANGEROUS PESTICIDES ON FARM WORKERS IN CALIFORNIA AND CALLS FOR IMMEDIATE ACTION TO END THE CONTINUING CHEMICAL WARFARE AGAINST FARM WORKERS

(Statement by Jerry J. Berman and Jim Hightower)

The Agribusiness Accountability Project (AAP) expresses outrage at discovering that the Niagara Chemical Company of Middleport, New York, and the Chemagro Corporation of Kansas City, Missouri, used farmworkers as guinea pigs to determine the safe use of pesticides already known to have caused injury to human beings. AAP calls on the President of the United States, the Secretary of Agriculture, the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, members of Congress, and all concerned citizens to take all necessary steps to bring an immediate and complete end to these barbaric experiments and to adopt national regulations to assure that pesticides and herbicides are safe for field workers before they are certified for use.

Niagara, a subsidiary of the giant FMC Corporation, and Chemagro, a subsidiary of Germany's largest drug manufacturer. A. G. Farbenfabriken-Bayer, manufacture Ethion and Guthion respectively. Both are highly toxic, organic phosphates that are listed by the California Department of Agriculture as "economic poisons and injurious materials." Both are used in California and elsewhere on citrus and other food crops.

Prior to the testing, a seven-day waiting period after application was adhered to before allowing field workers to reenter fields on which Ethion and Guthion were used. Despite this reentry period, there were 16 reports of injuries to farmworkers exposed to these poisons. Symptoms of illness included repeated vomiting, dizziness, excessive sweating, and impaired nervous systems.

Because of the injuries, the California Department of Agriculture imposed a 30 day reentry period for fieldworkers, pending a hearing to determine the actual safe period between application and reentry. In an appalling effort to build a case against the longer waiting period, Niagara and Chemagro, with the consent of the California Department of Agriculture, actually subjected a group of farmworkers, including women and children, to dangerous levels of these pesticides. The medical evidence obtained from these experiments on human beings clearly show that these persons suffered critical declines in plasma content and red blood cell counts.

There is much that is reprehensible and unpardonable even in the way the experiments were conducted:

First: The companies approached the workers through crew leaders at two separate ranches in Tulare County of California. Since the workers depend on the crew leaders for work, it is doubtful that those tested were "volunteers" in the meaningful sense of the term. There is no evidence that the workers received a careful explanation that the pesticides had been found dangerous. We do know that they were contracted on the basis of so much money for each blood test. The workers are unwilling to talk to our staff about the tests.

Second: Two work crews do not guarantee a random sample.

Third: Utter disregard for human beings was exhibited by Niagara. which allowed tests to be conducted on one 15-year old girl who had suffered a skull fracture in 1969; another 24-year old man under treatment for chronic headaches; a 38-year old woman suffering from anemia; and a 48-year old man with a peptic ulcer controlled by antacids.

Fourth Except for a blood test four days after the workers were allowed in the field (seven days after application), Niagara conducted no further tests. Chemagro only conducted tests for 21 days.

Fifth: Despite clear evidence that the workers showed critical declines in plasma content and red blood cell counts, no evidence is available that medical assistance or follow-up was conducted.

Instead, the companies went on to juggle their facts in a report submitted to the State of California's Department of Agriculture. It is expected that tomorrow, at a hearing on interval times, both Niagara and Chemagro will use their data to support what they set to prove with these tests on human beings: that a seven day waiting period is safe. If successful, the companies will protect their investment and expected profits, regardless of the obvious cost to the farmworker.

The role of the government in these tests cannot be ignored. Not only did the California Department of Agriculture consent to these tests, but they allowd the poisons on the market in the first place without fully knowing what their effect might be on farmworkers. Only after serious injury occurred did the State of California propose a 30-day interval. They hailed this proposed regulation as "a landmark in the field of farmworker safety." There is no certainty that even 30 days is a safe interval. But how is it possible that an issue of this ethical dimension-an issue of human experimentation-could in this country be reduced to a bureaucratic consideration of numbers? Is the California Department of Agriculture so insulated from human suffering that they can talk dispassionately of worker-intervals, when the real issue is whether this society is prepared to allow farmworkers to labor in poisons without knowing absolutely that there is no danger to their health?

Currently the Environmental Protection Agency of the Federal Government is under a U.S. Court of Appeals directive to reconsider the terms of certification for one pesticide based on a consideration of that pesticide's possible harmful effects on farmworkers. That directive included a court admonition to the Secretary of Agriculture for his failure to consider the effect of the pesticide on farmworkers in the first place.

The story of Niagara's and Chemagro's "guinea pig" experiments raises the problem of disregarding the farmworker again, not only because it add human experimentation as an issue in the consideration of the effects of pesticides on farmworkers, but also because two months after California imposed a 30-day limitation on Guthion, the U.S.D.A. recommended a "7-day period" in its so-called pesticide safety recommendations. How could this happen in light of the California injuries?

The most reprehensible and unpardonable aspect of these experiments, however, is that they were conducted at all. This experimentation goes far beyond a simple case of corporate irresponsibility; this is a case of corporate atrocity, committed for corporate profit. By what perverted sense of corporate ethics can this kind of human experimentation be justified? Are nectarines so tasty, so essential, so profitable that the very lives of human beings must be jeopardized? Are profits so dear or farmworkers so cheap that agribusiness can commit atrocities just to escape the nuisance of effective safety regulations? To assure agribusiness profit, an orange may have to cost a dime, but it must not cost the health of the harvestor. That added price is too much.

Seemingly the farmworker is not considered an equal of the consumed. Certainly, neither of these corporations would dare test the safety of their product by asking a consumer to eat citrus fruit that had been sprayed seven days earlier with Ethion or Guthion. Consumer tests, we must assume, are carried out on animals.

Why farmworkers, but not consumers: Because agribusiness perceives farmworkers more as "labor inputs" than as human beings; because farmworkers effectively are powerless to say no to their employers; and because farmworkers come cheap. These farmworkers received $3.50 a head to put their health on the line for each of the tests-that's probably cheaper than the going price of rats.

ACTION DEMANDED

The Agri-business Accountability Project calls on the President of the United States to come forward in active support of pesticide safety for farmworkers. On Monday of this week, the President issued a lengthy Message to Congress on environmental pollution, including a discussion and proposals relating to pesticides. Persident Nixon spoke of the dangers of pesticides for "several of our bird spices," but he did not deal with the danger to those persons who must work in these poisons. Farmworkers are a part of our environment too, and pesticide pollution is more than an abstract or aesthetic matter to them.

The Environmental Protection Agency, created by President Nixon, has the power to issue regulations under the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act that would ban human experimentation and that would prohibit the certification of pesticides that are not absolutely safe for farmworkers. Having that power, it has that responsibility.

Specifically, the Agri-business Accountability Project plans to file a petition with the Environmental Protection Agency asking it to promulgate an emergency rule under the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act that would prohibit pesticide experimentation on live human beings.

In addition, the Agri-business Accountability Project has sent letters to President Nixon, to the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency (William Ruckelshaus), to the Secretary of Agriculture (Clifford Hardin), to the Secretary of Labor (James Hodgson), to the Chairman of the House Agriculture Committee (W. R. Poage), to the Chairman of the Senate Agriculture Committee (Herman Talmade), and to other Washington officials. In each of these letters, AAP has called on the official to exercise his power and influence in order to cause immediate, national action that would:

(1) Provide that no future insecticide, fungicide, or rodenticide may be certified unless it is absolutely safe for use by those who must work with or around it; and,

(2) Provide, on a reasonable timed schedule, for the recall, retesting, and recertification of all previously certified insecticides, fungicides, or rodenticides used by or around farmworkers, in order to determine that such insecticides, fungicides, and rodenticides are absolutely safe for farmworkers.

EXHIBIT B

NIAGARA CHEMICAL CO. AND CHEMAGRO CORP. PESTICIDE EXPERIMENTATIONS WITH CALIFORNIA FARMWORKERS

(Statement by A. V. Krebs, Jr., California field researcher)

My story is of human experimentation with poisonous chemicals by two major U.S. pesticide manufacturers seeking to justify brief worker reentry times while using dozens of California farm laborers as “guinea pigs.”

The tests were conducted last summer by Niagara Chemical Company (Middleport, N.Y.) and Chemagro Corp. (Kans. City, Mo.) while attempting to prove to the California Department of Agriculture that their organic phosphate pesticides Ethion and Guthion were safe within seven days after application. (See attached exhibit A.)

The companies were already aware, however, that 16 farm laborers who had been working in fields poisoned for two weeks with their products had become ill-some vomiting repeatedly, others dizzy and sweating excessively, their plasma and red blood cell cholinesterase values abnormally low.

As a California field researcher for the Agribusiness Accountability Project I have examined the companies' reports and evaluations of them by the Community Studies on Pesticides division of the California Department of Public Health. They clearly show that the health of many of the participating farm workers were seriously imperiled during the experimentations and that they should not have been allowed to remain as subjects.

Some specific examples of the callousness we have noted in these reports include this passage from the Chemagro report: "The Wettable Powder (WP) formulations were used because it is believed that the greatest hazard to workers may be due to inhalation of dust containing the pesticide. The WP should give the maximum inhalation exposure."

In the Niagara experiment these people were just six more test specimens: a 24-year old male under treatment for chronic headaches; a 44-year old male with diabetes controlled by oral medication; a 21-year old male with chronically poor appetite; a 46-year old male with peptic ulcer controlled with antacids; a 15-year old female with three years field work experience who fractured her skull in 1969; and a 38-year old female with anemia receiving no current treatment.

Niagara and Chemagro's studies came in response to an emergency order issued on June 19, 1970 by the California Department of Agriculture requiring a 30-day reentry interval after application of Ethion and Cuthion in citrus orchards.

As I indicated earlier the California Agriculture Department's ruling was occasioned by a series of three organic phosphate poisoning cases in Tulare County in late May, 1970 among citrus picking crews. (See attached Exhibit B.) The 16 workers became ill after working in fields which had been treated with organic phosphate pesticides 12-14 days earlier.

After examining the careful statistical analysis of the companies' experimentation by the California Community Studies on Pesticides it is clear that the chemical companies' findings do not corroborate but rather refute Niagara and