parathion insecticide may be responsible for malignant transformation of breast cells

[Margerie]

I grew up in Mississippi in the early 70's. I remember every summer, there were days we weren't allowed outside at night because of the mosquito spray trucks were hitting the neighborhoods. Hit puberty then too!

[Hopeful]

I remember the mosquito spray trucks coming down my street several times a summer, as a young girl (around age 9 - 12 or 13, at least; I hit puberty one month before I turned 11). Kids used to perversely run behind the trucks in the spray. Studies say early exposure to carcinogens leads to increased bc . . .

Hopeful

[Lani]

in the San Jose/Peninsula area in the mid/late 70s to early to mid 80s for an infestation that threatened fruit crops.

We were told to park our cars insides to avoid the paint on the cars being ruined by the spraying !!!!!

[Donna]

Interesting thread..........

I was in the Bay Area for training for a job during a spray of malathion which is the same sort of mosquito spray - and we weren't notified at the hotel to cover our cars - the spray did eat the paint on my car. It looked like huge rust spots all over it and my insurance company was one of the few that paid for a new paint job. It was so corrosive that it ate all the way down to the metal, it was awful. I was so amazed that people weren't more concerned about it - if it would do that to the paint on my car, good gawd, what would it do to human tissues and lungs?????

Now we know, huh?

I don't suppose one exposure would be enough, but who would know?

Donna

[Lani]

I guess the malathion got some of my brain cells!

[dberg]

Like Hopeful I spent many summer nights in the 60s chasing the mosquito trucks in Florida! All the kids in the neighborhood joined in. What were our parents thinking?

[Hopeful]

dberg,

I didn't run behind the trucks, though kids in my neighborhood did. I remember my mother shouting, "Close the windows!" at the first sign of the trucks, and the drill was we all ran around the house closing doors and windows (this was circa 1963, pre-air conditioning in my house). I do recall that noxious mist coming right through my bedroom window as I slammed it shut.

Hopeful

[Mary Anne in TX]

who chased the sprayers! How bad was that! I grew up in the greater Houston area and they sprayed all the time! ma