
High prevalence of diabetes among people exposed to organophosphates in India - aethertap
https://genomebiology.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13059-016-1134-6
======
yomly
This headline explains my general aversion to "chemicals". This, despite the
fact that everything is a chemical and that we are all little chemical
machines.

The human physiology is unfathomably complex and the advent of synthetic
chemistry has meant that we are now exposed to new molecules which have arisen
at a rate tens, hundreds of thousands of years too early for our bodies to
evolve to accommodate for them. Our exposure to these chemicals is also
incredibly opaque: even eating "clean" by eating fruit and veg exposes us to a
multitude of chemicals that come along the pipeline including fertilisers,
pesticides and preservatives.

Nature is exquisitely sensitive to chemistry - I recall reading that natural
systems have evolved to exploit and dispatch behaviour based on the isotopic
composition of carbon-based molecules: naturally synthesised molecules also
have a different isotopic profile to artificially synthesised molecules. For
the record, Carbon-13 represents ~1% of the natural isotopic abundance.

If something as granular as the isotopic distribution of elements is important
to physiological systems, how can we be so complacent as to constantly pile
chemicals into every aspect of our lives?

Businesses will wantonly and irresponsibly use any method to increase their
bottom lines and it falls to regulators to moderate this behaviour. As an
example, I recall McDonald's doping their chip oil with a known toxic organic
chemical to lower the rate of thermal decomposition of their oil. This is
something they could as easily avoid by replacing their oil more often, but
this is costly: they instead defer this cost onto our health by exposing us to
unnecessarily dangerous chemicals.

In my opinion the FDA's (or indeed global regulators') thresholds for the use
of chemicals is not stringent enough - humans are living longer, how do we
know that prolonged exposure to any of these individual chemicals (let alone
the cocktail of all of them) over a 50-100 year period are worth the risk?

For another anecdote of irresponsible chemical usage - the onset of lung
cancer through smoking underwent a stepwise increase after the tobacco
industry started using phosphate fertilisers to increase their crop yield: a
side effect of the fertilisers was to enrich the soil in radium which would
decay down to Pollonium-210, an alpha source of Russian-assassination fame.
Studies have been done on characterising the sievert profile of tobacco
leaves, highlighting the risk of this but no action on the tobacco industry
has been taken to mitigate this.

~~~
Houshalter
I love this quote from E.T. Jaynes:

>A common error, when judging the effects of radioactivity or the toxicity of
some substance, is to assume a linear response model without threshold (that
is, without a dose rate below which there is no ill effect). Presumably there
is no threshold effect for cumulative poisons like heavy metal ions (mercury,
lead), which are eliminated only very slowly if at all. But for virtually
every organic substance (such as saccharin or cyclamates), the existence of a
finite metabolic rate means that there must exist a finite threshold dose
rate, below which the substance is decomposed, eliminated, or chemically
altered so rapidly that it has no ill effects. If this were not true, the
human race could never have survived to the present time, in view of all the
things we have been eating.

>Indeed, every mouthful of food you and I have ever taken contained many
billions of kinds of complex molecules whose structure and physiological
effects have never been determined—and many millions of which would be toxic
or fatal in large doses. We cannot doubt that we are daily ingesting thousands
of substances that are far more dangerous than saccharin—but in amounts that
are safe, because they are far below the various thresholds of toxicity. But
at present there is hardly any substance except some common drugs, for which
we actually know the threshold.

The most dangerous substances fall into a few categories. Things like
insecticides (which is what this thread is about) are _designed_ to kill
animals. Insects, but still, their physiology is close enough to humans. And
things like heavy metals and radioactive substances. Which our ancestors
weren't really exposed to.

~~~
7952
Can anyone tell if this applies to carcinogens? Can a tiny amount cause
cellular damage and lead to cancer?

~~~
Blackthorn
It's all about luck, you know? They'll all cause some sort of cellular damage.
Cancer is when you get super unlucky and it's the right sort of cellular
damage that leads to unchecked growth and disables apoptosis.

~~~
otempomores
You can load the dice by playing very slowly..eat little..slow metsbolism
makes for slow metastasis.

~~~
pinko
Can you point to any credible information on this prescription?

~~~
pm90
Seems more like common sense doesn't it? You decrease the chances of consuming
random poisons in food by... consuming less food.

~~~
edejong
Well, your hypothesis is definitely scientific, since it can be disproven.
Couple of counter-hypotheses:

\- Consuming less food requires the body to use fat-reserves. Some of these
might have been storing heavy metals. With a quick enough change in diet,
these might pose a significant risk.

\- Consuming less food might alter your gut microbiology. Disheveling this
balance might create the risk of infection or even worse.

\- Consuming less food (to be precise, less lipids), might alter, or even
disable certain parts of the metabolism, often leading to deficiencies in
supplies for the immune system, thus making us more vulnerable to 'poisons'.

I don't know which of the above hypotheses are correct, but I am sure they are
just as (un)likely as yours is.

------
indogooner
From conclusion: _Hence, rather than searching for other chemical
alternatives, promotion and development of traditional self-sustainable,
nature-based agricultural practices would be the right approach to feed this
world._

Living off organic produce is not possible (at least in India as of now). The
farmers do not earn much and have debts to pay-off. The only way they know of
saving crops is using subsidised fertilizers provided by the government. Over
the years indiscriminate use of pesticides has increased. In fact availability
of Urea was a poll issue in National Election in some parts of India. [1]

[1] [http://www.financialexpress.com/opinion/neem-coated-urea-
why...](http://www.financialexpress.com/opinion/neem-coated-urea-why-is-
narendra-modi-govt-waiting-for-5-years-to-make-india-self-sufficient-in-
fertilisers/454215/)

------
SCAQTony
...and 36 of them are in use within the United States.

Emphasis below on chlorpyrifos which Trump's EPA took off the EPA's banned
list. EPA bulletin written before Trump took office:

"...Thirty-six of them [organophosphates] are presently registered for use in
the United States, and all can potentially cause acute and subacute toxicity.
Organophosphates are used in agriculture, homes, gardens and veterinary
practices; however, in the past decade, several notable OPs have been
discontinued for use, including parathion, which is no longer registered for
any use, and chlorpyrifos, which is no longer registered for home use. ..."

[https://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/documents/rmpp_6t...](https://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/documents/rmpp_6thed_ch5_organophosphates.pdf)

------
firasd
The mechanism they pinpointed is illustrated in "Figure 7":

 _OPs (star) enter the human digestive system via food and are metabolized
into acetic acid (trapezoid) by the gut microbiota (oval). Subsequently,
acetic acid was absorbed by the intestinal cells and the majority of them were
transported to the liver through the periportal vein. Eventually, acetic acid
was converted into glucose (hexagon) by gluconeogenesis in the intestine and
liver and thus accounts for glucose intolerance._

So the pesticide is being eventually converted into glucose, which has the
same effect as if you were eating too much sugar/carbs.

~~~
msandford
Not at all correct. Acetic acid at 5% is vinegar. You can consume substantial
quantities of that without dramatically increasing your diabetes risk. The
damage had to be happening upstream of acetic acid.

~~~
gukov
If anything, vinegar lowers glycemic response, ie blood glucose doesn't go as
high after a meal.

------
tudorw
Farmers working with Sheep Dip chemicals have been studied;

[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2078460/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2078460/)

[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3366364/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3366364/)

[http://www.fwi.co.uk/livestock/op-sheep-dip-illness-new-
deta...](http://www.fwi.co.uk/livestock/op-sheep-dip-illness-new-details-
emerge.htm)

[http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/11561630/That-sheep-
dip-p...](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/11561630/That-sheep-dip-
poisoning-disaster-they-tried-to-keep-secret.html)

[https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/apr/20/revealed...](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/apr/20/revealed-
government-knew-of-farm-poisoning-risk-but-failed-to-act)

There is also 'Genetic variation in susceptibility to chronic effects of
organophosphate exposure'
[http://www.hse.gov.uk/research/rrpdf/rr408.pdf](http://www.hse.gov.uk/research/rrpdf/rr408.pdf)

Gulf War Syndrome has also been studied as a possible effect of close range
exposure to organophosphates in pesticides and inset repellents.

------
spencermountain
to summarize, crop pesticides are converted to glucose internally, causing
diabetes.

a pretty big plot-twist for a delirious problem in global health, and a find
that resembles a 21st century silent-spring.

~~~
aftbit
For those who haven't heard of it:

Silent Spring is an environmental science book by Rachel Carson.[1] The book
was published on 27 September 1962 and it documented the detrimental effects
on the environment of the indiscriminate use of pesticides. Carson accused the
chemical industry of spreading disinformation and public officials of
accepting industry claims unquestioningly.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silent_Spring](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silent_Spring)

Congrats on being one of today's lucky 10000[1], just like me.

1: [https://xkcd.com/1053/](https://xkcd.com/1053/)

------
salesguy222
Neato, how do we avoid exposure to that pesticide?

~~~
krona
Unsurprisingly, insect-resident crops. If you're in the US, there's a good
chance you're already doing it.

 _Farmers generally use less insecticide when they plant Bt corn and Bt
cotton. Corn insecticide use by both GE seed adopters and nonadopters has
decreased—only 9 percent of all U.S. corn farmers used insecticides in 2010.
Insecticide use on corn farms declined from 0.21 pound per planted acre in
1995 to 0.02 pound in 2010. This is consistent with the steady decline in
European corn borer populations over the last decade that has been shown to be
a direct result of Bt adoption._

\--Fernandez-Cornejo and Caswell, 2006; NRC, 2010

~~~
sebleon
I can't tell if krona is trolling. We're exposing people to more insecticides
in their diet when the plant itself produces insecticides!

At least spraying puts insecticides on the outside of the plant, which is
somewhat washable. Making the kernels of corn that we eat produce insecticides
makes it impossible to remove these chemicals from our dinner plates....

~~~
maxerickson
As a layperson, I'm pretty sure I'd rather eat corn laced with Bt than corn
with organophosphates rinsed off.

~~~
sebleon
That's kind of a strawman argument - what about corn laced with
organophosphates vs corn that's been genetically modified to generate
organophosphates in the kernels?

------
eni
The original title of the article: "Gut microbial degradation of
organophosphate insecticides-induces glucose intolerance via gluconeogenesis"

Why is the title in HN edited to make this about "India"? Is this finding not
applicable to people elsewhere? or id other parts of the world stop using
organophosphates?

------
notadoc
The primary reason most people I know who eat organic do so to avoid
pesticides and herbicides.

~~~
cmrdporcupine
Good luck finding organic staple crops such as rice, wheat, or maize.

~~~
notadoc
Good luck?

There is no luck required assuming you have access to well-stocked grocery
stores.

------
curtis
I wonder if the people in India most likely to be exposed to organophosphates
in India are also the people most likely to be living almost entirely off of
rice. Did the study do a sufficiently good job eliminating obvious confounding
factors?

------
porker
Misread the title as "..linked to gluten intolerance". Was hoping it would
shine a light on that increasing.

~~~
jawngee
Side note, gluten intolerance and diabetes type 1 often go hand in hand. When
my kid was diagnosed, they tested both of us for a whole bunch of things. I
came back gluten intolerant and he, luckily, did not. Celiac is another thing
that often coexists with T1D.

------
mtw
It's not just diabetes - exposure to pesticides increases risk of suicide,
lymphoma, ALS. congenital anomalies and reduces fertility. There is a solid
case in choosing organic foods. See summary of risks here
[http://outcomereference.com/causes/77](http://outcomereference.com/causes/77)

------
mtdewcmu
I was always suspicious of the diet/lifestyle explanation for diabetes. It's
conveniently unfalsifiable, and it's obnoxiously paternalistic and moralizing.

------
jlebrech
and of course the rise of the standard american diet in the 3rd world has
nothing to do with it?

