Actions of Vermont exterminator lead to pesticide investigation

Not keeping up-to-date with your company’s pest killing chemicals and neglecting to maintain proper pesticide labels with information dictating the right usage can both injure users and reflect negatively on your business. This could happen without your business being aware of it, and all it takes is one mistake.

For example, Vermont Public Radio noted recently that a state-area exterminator has been targeted by the Environmental Protection Agency for using a type of pesticide that has been officially banned by the federal government for having multiple types of possibly dangerous effects on humans. Although the investigation began with a single home, now it appears that hundreds might contain traces of this chemical.

An employee of Vermont’s Agency of Agriculture named Cary Giguere described to the VPR the severity in this kind of case.

“There were human health concerns and that pesticide is what we were finding on our swab samples at very, very high levels,” he said.

While it’s unclear what the cause of this mass contamination truly is, pesticide labels should try to cut down on the chance that dangerous materials might be spread. The particular exterminator in this case was apparently licensed and highly rated, but the fact that the chemical he was using (reportedly known as “chlorpyrifos”) has been deemed toxic for several years means that there was likely little indication that damage of this scale could be done.

It’s every producer’s responsibility to make sure that chemical labels are treated with the appropriate seriousness. Slacking off in this department could be fatal and result in a large-scale emergency.