Breathing Causes ADHD

  • by: |
  • 05/17/2010
An "study"  (i.e. torturing data until it tells you what you want to conclude) showing that pesticides cause ADHD was widely reported in the news today.

Like previous studies claiming a link between cell phones, constipation, food additives, etc., this one is designed to provoke fear and not inform. 

I won't go into the many problems with this study, let alone the fact that it correlated an ADHD diagnosis with undetectable amounts of phosphate based pesticides in a kid's pee.   (How can you -- absent clinical markers -- measure something that is statistically undetectable?)  But how about these four facts to put this piece of garbage into context:

1.   The prevalance of ADHD, once adjusted for diagnostic accuracy, is about the same in the US as it is in Europe or South America. 

2.    Pesticide use in the US has decreased since 1970.   Meanwhile prevalence rates have remained the same or increased slightly. 

3.   ADHD can be geographically clustered and found more commonly in single parent families.     Where you live and your family life are associated with ADHD though the relationship is certainly not causal.   

4.    ADHD is highly heritable... up to 75 to 90 percent of ADHD among kids is associated with shared genetic traits...

5.   Articles reporting on the "study"  quote one of the authors as saying that the pesticides might cause ADHD because " the primary action of organophosphates is to inhibit acetylcholinesterase, and disruptions in cholinergic signaling are thought to occur in ADHD."  However, what little work on  acetylcholinesterase levels and ADHD suggest that higher serum levels are associated with ADHD, not lower.  If pesticides are inhibitors of serum production then they should be used as medication...   Indeed, inhibiting these levels is how Alzheimer's and autism can be treated...  

Has anyone in the media taken the time to do anything but spread the stupidity and fear?  Of course not.  


CMPI

Center for Medicine in the Public Interest is a nonprofit, non-partisan organization promoting innovative solutions that advance medical progress, reduce health disparities, extend life and make health care more affordable, preventive and patient-centered. CMPI also provides the public, policymakers and the media a reliable source of independent scientific analysis on issues ranging from personalized medicine, food and drug safety, health care reform and comparative effectiveness.

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