Toxic pesticides are decimating pollinators

Since the use of toxic neonic pesticides took off in the mid-2000s, we’ve lost countless bees, butterflies, and other pollinators. Fewer bees = less food which could further impact communities already suffering from food insecurity.

The EPA is conducting a once-every-fifteen-year review of neonic pesticides and needs to hear from the public that these chemicals are unsafe to use.

Send your letter now to the EPA and demand that it restrict neonics and protect pollinators, vulnerable wildlife, and our food supply.

Tell the EPA to restrict neonic pesticides that are killing bees and butterflies and pushing species to extinction.

Since the use of toxic neonic pesticides took off in the mid-2000s, we’ve lost countless bees, butterflies, and other pollinators. Neonics are so toxic that just a kernel of corn coated in neonic pesticides at approved rates can kill 250,000 bees.

Now, a new analysis by the EPA says that these widely used toxins are also likely driving 200 species toward extinction — including the rusty patched bumble bee, Hine’s emerald dragonfly, and Karner blue butterfly.

As pollinator populations plummet, crop yields for foods like blueberries, cherries and apples have declined, which could threaten the future of our food supply and further impact communities already suffering from food insecurities.

The EPA is conducting a once-every-fifteen-year review of neonic pesticides and needs to hear from the public that these chemicals are unsafe to use. It’s time we act to save pollinators and the web of life they sustain.

CTA

Your Message

Subject Save our pollinators, our health, and our food supply from neonics

Dear Administrator Regan:

Message Body

Our vital bees and other pollinators are being decimated by the widespread use of toxic pesticides called neonics.

Yet the EPA has failed to ban the uses of neonics that are fueling this crisis. We cannot afford to lose more pollinators. Less bees = less food.

A decline in the population of pollinators can result in increased food costs, reduced access to healthy food, and worsening food insecurity – crises that will hit low-income communities and communities of color especially hard.

Plus, neonics could be a health risk to people as well: studies show that neonic exposure during pregnancy was associated with elevated risks of birth defects affecting the heart and brain, and other neurological conditions. 
 
As your agency nears completion of a once-every-fifteen-year safety review for neonic pesticides, I call on you to follow the science, resist industry influence, and impose long overdue restrictions on these toxic chemicals in order to protect pollinators, our food supply, and human health. Until the EPA imposes restrictions on neonics that protect pollinators and human health, I will stand with NRDC — both in and out of court — to end this chemical assault.

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