TAKE ACTION ON INERTS!

Between now and April 23, you have a once in a generation chance to do something. That's because EPA recently announced that it's considering requiring pesticide companies to disclose inert ingredients.

The Northwest Coalition for Alternatives to Pesticides, health advocates and others have been pushing for this disclosure for more than twenty years.

EPA is accepting public comments on its proposal until April 23, and it needs your support. Please take action today to demand your right to know when pesticide companies expose you to toxic chemicals. Please share this opportunity your friends and family.

Read the sample letter below, craft one of your own and submit it by clicking the link at the bottom of this page.

When it comes to our families' health, there should be no secrets. With your help, we can close the pesticide industry's inert ingredient loophole. It's an opportunity we can't afford to miss!

SAMPLE LETTER TO EPA

Kerry Leifer
Office of Pesticide Programs (OPP) Regulatory Public Docket (7502P)
Environmental Protection Agency
1200 Pennsylvania Ave., NW.
Washington, DC 20460–0001

Dear Mr. Leifer:

Thank you for the opportunity to comment on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's proposal to seek disclosure of inert ingredients in pesticide products. As a consumer that might be faced with an insect or other pest problem, I want to know what is in the products I may seek to control these pests. Furthermore, my family and I are affiliated with institutions (for example, schools, churches, cities and towns) that may use pesticides. We want to help these institutions make better choices about what they use to manage pests.

We support EPA's proposal to require that pesticide product labels identify inert ingredients that have already classified as hazardous by EPA. We support the use of the lists identified in the 2006 petitions concerning this issue to identify these hazardous inerts. We support this action now as a relatively quick interim step while EPA moves forward with more complete disclosure.

We also support EPA's proposal to require complete or almost complete disclosure of inert ingredients on pesticide product labels. We request that EPA begin this process now and move forward with it as soon as is possible.

Identifying inert ingredients on the label will help those of use who have allergies or sensitivities and need to avoid particular chemicals. It will also help paramedics, doctors and other health professionals who need to make treatment decisions quickly for a patient. In addition, it will help those who purchase pesticides because they will be able to easily identify the products with less hazardous ingredients.

We know that names of some of the inert ingredients are complicated chemical names that most of us will not recognize. However, we know that we can ask nonprofit organizations, physicians, and scientific researchers for help in understanding the toxicology and environmental impacts of these chemicals. We also can make use of the many sources of online information. This information will allow us to understand the risks to people who are exposed to the product as well as the broader environmental risks.

Thanks for the opportunity to comment on this important issue.

Your name
Your e-mail
Your zip-code

Please submit letter to EPA here
(

For more information, see original petition from 2006 here.