Working with health inspectors

Last week I had the privilege of providing IPM training to a group of state and local health inspectors from south Texas.  It was the first time I've had the chance to train health inspectors and it was an interesting experience. 

I learned that being a health inspector is likely to permanently dull your enjoyment of going out to eat.  After all, health inspectors see the (sometimes) scary underbelly of the food services industry.  Even in the restaurants with good records, if an inspector eats out, he or she is wondering how long the salad's been out, if the preparer was wearing clean gloves,  whether the refrigerators are cold enough, and if the dishwashers have been properly trained to disinfect the silverware.  Sometimes ignorance is bliss.

Unlike Larry the Cable Guy: Health Inspector (I've not seen the movie, but the subtitle is "They'll give anyone a badge"), these folks were professionals, very dedicated to their work and making sure the public health is protected.

The other thing I learned was how hungry these health inspectors are for IPM information.  Relatively few inspectors in our group seemed to have a strong understanding of pest management principles, or how the pest control business works. 

One of the more interesting discussions we had concerned the use of sticky cards as monitoring devices in restaurants.  As a PMP, you may have encountered restaurant owners who are unwilling to allow insect sticky cards in their establishment because they are afraid that any insects on the cards might alert the inspector to an insect problem that they might not otherwise know about.  After our training and discussion, everyone in the class agreed that having sticky cards in an establishment was a positive thing, as it showed that the owner cared, and was serious about monitoring the condition of the business.  [Of course sticky cards can be a two-edged sword.  Sticky cards that are not maintained and changed regularly can reflect conditions that no longer exist in the restaurant, and are likely a sign of lack of attention to detail on the part of the technician.] 

I learned that health inspectors try to look at the bigger picture when they score an eating establishment, school or day care.  An inspector will not necessarily consider a single cockroach on a trap or on the floor an "unacceptable" infestation.  It takes more infractions than just cockroaches or rodents to shut down a restaurant.  The inspector considers the overall condition of the facility, if the owners are making an effort to solve pest problems and whether they're employing the expertise of a professional. 

A good PMP can make the job of a health inspector easier.  Sticky cards and bait stations should be signed and dated every inspection.  Detailed documentation of what species of pests were observed, what conducive conditions for pests you've noted, pesticide types and amounts used, along with non-chemical controls employed, and the progress of the pest control program can be very helpful to an inspector. 

Health inspectors can be, and should be, the allies of pest control professionals.  After all, the goal of both kinds of professionals should be the same, namely: clean, pest-free and sanitary eating and living places.  I wish for our industry a better and closer relationship with health inspectors.  If you have the chance to meet an inspector don't neglect to ask them questions about how your customer's restaurants are scoring, what their perspectives are on pest control, and maybe provide some information about how your company approaches IPM.  You might gain a referral or two; and you might help them understand your perspective a little better.  

For my part, I hope to do more trainings with these public health professionals.  Wouldn't it be nice to know that your health inspector feels comfortable eating at any of the restaurants your company services?  That would be worth celebrating with a nice dinner out. 

Houston crazy ant seminar

Just a quick post to pass on information about a BASF-sponsored crazy ant seminar in Houston on the 24th of this month.  It's free and designed to teach you more about what is known about the ant, control strategies, and the special (Section 18) labeling Termidor carries for treating this ant.  Read more.

Last year I went to a similar symposium for government agencies in Brazoria county.  Click here to see the YouTube report on that session.

Termidor trials

If there's a blockbuster pesticide of the past decade, it has to be fipronil for termite control.  Therefore, it's of great interest to read the article today by Dan Moreland of PCT magazine.  Moreland does a nice job explaining the legal battlefronts forming over the pending expiration of the fipronil patent.

Fipronil was patented in 1990 by Rhône-Poulenc, back in the days of 20 year patents (patents since 1995 are 17 years).  This sounds like an exceedingly long time, but because of delays between filing a patent and bringing a product to market, and the high cost of product development and lead time necessary to see a product gain acceptance in the marketplace, most manufacturers will tell you that seventeen years flies about as fast as the blink of an accountant's eye.

Needless to say, BASF and Bayer, holders of the fipronil patent, are not excited to see the patent expire this August.  Actively waiting in the wings, to see what the courts decide, are two generic pesticide manufacturers, Cheminova A/S and Makhteshim Agan of North America. At stake is the price you will pay for fipronil for termite control over the foreseeable future, as well as the boundaries of intellectual property for commercial pesticides.

I encourage you to keep informed about the battle. It should be interesting.

Ants star in new novel by E. O. Wilson

Last month I was catching up on some old "All Things Considered" podcasts, and caught an April 2nd interview with renowned entomologist E. O. Wilson of Harvard University (yes there are a few "renowned" entomologists).  In case you are not familiar with Dr. Wilson, he is one of those rare brilliant scientists who can do science well and communicate very well to an audience far beyond the narrow world of insect-ologists.

Wilson could have laid down his collecting forceps and put aside his microscope in comfortable retirement years ago, and felt pretty darn good about his accomplishments.  He was one of the first discoverers of the red imported fire ant, and is author of more than 20 books, including his Pulitzer Prize-winning book, The Ants.  Instead he has continued with his writings, most of which these days have a conservation theme.

Describing himself Wilson says, "Every kid has a bug phase. I just never grew out of mine."  And I for one am glad he hasn't. I had the chance to meet Dr. Wilson several years ago when he gave a lecture at Texas Tech University.  My one claim to fame (if fame includes having an intimate association with a famous person) is that my early years, and possibly the seeds of my interest in biology, were spent in the same small Alabama town as Wilson. Wilson writes about his early years, including time in Brewton, AL, in his memoir, Naturalist.

Anyway, Wilson has recently published his first work of fiction, called Ant Hill: A Novel. In it, ants play a major character part, with some 70 pages devoted to life inside a fictional ant colony.  When asked why he decided to jump into writing fiction, Wilson noted that "whereas people respect non-fiction, they read novels."

Quoting the Publishers' Weekly review,

Wilson (The Ants) channels Huck Finn in his creative coming-of-age debut novel. Split into three parallel worlds—ants, humans, and the biosphere—the story follows young Raff Cody, who escapes the humid summers in Clayville, Ala., by exploring the remote Nokobee wilderness with his cousin, Junior. In one adventure, sneaking onto the property of a reputed multiple murderer to peek at his rumored 1,000-pound pet alligator, 15-year-old Raff faces down the barrel of a rifle. Raff's aversion to game hunting, ant fascination, Boy Scout achievements, and Harvard education all support his core need to remain a naturalist explorer. A remarkable center section meticulously details the life and death of an ant colony. Nearing 30, Raff's desire to preserve the Nokobee reserve from greedy real estate developers galvanizes an effort to protect the sacred land and a surprise violent ending brings everything full circle. Lush with organic details, Wilson's keen eye for the natural world and his acumen for environmental science is on brilliant display in this multifaceted story about human life and its connection to nature.

Every PMP with an interest in ants owes it to him- or herself to check out some of Wilson's writings.  I haven't yet had the time to sit down with Wilson's novel, but it is on my summer reading list.  To hear the interview with E.O. Wilson, click here. To see more reviews, check out the publisher's site.

 

Mosquito repellent help

Pest management professionals are exposed to all sorts of health risks, including many of the same pests that afflict their customers. Mosquitoes and ticks are among the worst offenders.  Even if you're not in one of the parts of the state where you risk being eaten alive, we all can potentially be affected by West Nile virus and other mosquito- and tick-borne diseases.

A good mosquito repellent is an essential tool for the PMP. Mosquito repellents are without question one of the marvels of technology. Gone are the days of slathering smelly bear grease on your body to ward off the hungry hoardes. Using modern technology, a quick spray or small dab of cream and you can be protected effectively from the bites of mosquitoes, ticks and biting flies for hours.

It's both a blessing and a curse that there are literally hundreds of repellent products on the market. Choosing the best repellent can be confusing. For many years the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and most entomologists recommended DEET as the most reliable repellent for most pests. I still recommend DEET for most professionals heading out for a day's work, because one application of the right product can provide day-long protection.  But some of us don't care for the smell of many DEET formulations, and others report sensitivity to DEET.  Fortunately, in the past few years researchers have found acceptable alternatives.  Many of these products provide equal protection, although DEET appears to still be tops for length of protection.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the National Pesticide Information Center both recently posted a handy online tool to help you choose a repellent. The core of the calculator is a database that cross-references registered repellents against their expected hourly protection times against ticks and mosquitoes. Simply enter the pest you are concerned about, how long you need protection for, and (if you have one in mind) the active ingredient you are interested in. It then produces a download-able list of commercial repellents that meet your needs.

The calculator is relatively simple and, unfortunately, does not cover biting flies other than mosquitoes. I was also a little disappointed that it doesn’t give a reliability rating or provide references to the research on which the data is based (OK, I’m a skeptical scientist…you may not feel the need for this feature). What you will find if you use the calculator is that there are a number of acceptable alternatives to DEET that you may not be aware of–especially if you don’t need 10 hours of protection.

The EPA calculator can be found at http://cfpub.epa.gov/oppref/insect/
The NPIC calculator can be found at http://npic.orst.edu/repel

Also, for lots more information about mosquitoes and mosquito control, don’t forget the Mosquito Safari website. This site is has lots of information about where to find and how to treat mosquitoes.

So next time you head out for accounts with mosquito activity, don’t forget the repellent. And be thankful for the many alternatives to bear grease.

Pesticides and ADHD

In case you haven't seen or heard the story this week about scientific research showing a link between pesticides and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in children, I think it's important enough to pass on.  According to the Time magazine story, researchers at the University of Montreal and Harvard University this week reported in the journal Pediatrics a statistical correlation between ADHD and exposure to organophosphate (OP) pesticides.

Before discussing the results, we should note that there are different ways to study environmental causes of disease.  The most straightforward approach is to take a randomly selected group of subjects from a population you are interested in (say males of a certain age), and subject them to a level of the environmental chemical or condition, say pesticides, or microwaves from cell phones, etc.  You then compare the health of this exposure group over time to a randomly selected group of subjects without the exposure.  This type of controlled experiment is one of the more rigorous ways to test an hypothesis and show a cause-effect relationship.  However, this sort of approach is rarely possible for practical and ethical reasons.  Who wants to volunteer themselves for a study of the possible effects of a toxic chemical on your health?  Fifty dollar stipend anyone?

Another approach would be to look for people who have been naturally exposed (via their lifestyle, or home environment, etc.) to an environmental chemical and compare their health parameters to a group who has not been naturally exposed.  This is a valid research method and has been used many times to study the effects of environmental chemicals on human health.  It's important to realize, however, that this approach measures correlation, which is not the same thing as cause and effect.  If they looked, for example, researchers might find a correlation between heart attacks and watching at least two football games on TV each week.  This would not, however, prove that watching football causes heart attacks.  The actual cause could be something entirely different.  Something co-related to football watching, like lack of exercise and big bowls of greasy nachos!!?  The point is that it is very easy to have a correlation without a cause and effect relationship.

Of course this was the same argument cigarette companies made for many years.  Correlations, if done properly, can provide valuable suggestive evidence, but must always be looked at critically to make sure that all relevant variables have been properly controlled. Typically correlative studies are done as preliminary to a more rigorous study, or as a second choice when more rigorous studies are not possible to conduct.  We cannot afford to dismiss correlations as uninformative.

In the case of this study from the University of Montreal, Maryse Bouchard and a team of colleagues analyzed the levels of chemicals called dialkyl phosphates in the urine of more than 1,100 children ages 8 to 15.  Dialkyl phosphates (DAPs) are metabolic "breakdown" products of OPs. Like nacho crumbs left in the sofa cushion, DAPs are left behind in the blood and the urine after someone has been exposed to OP pesticides. Measuring DAPs in blood and urine is much more sensitive than acetylcholinesterase tests (used by many PMPs in the past to measure OP overexposure), and an accepted way to document previous exposure to OP pesticides in epidemiological studies.  Bouchard's study found that children in the study group with the highest levels of which are breakdown products of OPs had the highest incidence of ADHD.  In other words, there was a correlation between DAPs and ADHD.  To see a free abstract of the study, click here.

The researchers, as all good researchers should, made it clear that this is a correlation which falls short of proof that organophosphate insecticides are a cause, or even a contributing factor to, ADHD.  I am no expert on ADHD, nor on the validity of the chemical analyses or the epidemiological methods used by the authors of this study, but studies like this serve as a cautionary tale for the use of pesticides in urban environments or on food.  The possibility of subtle health effects on humans is always present with the widespread use of synthetic chemicals. But the potential risks always must be weighed against the undoubted benefits of pest control.

Here are a few things to keep in mind should you find yourself in the position of justifying to local media or your customers the use of pesticides as pest control tools.

• The pesticide class which was the focus of this study is, for the most part, no longer widely used in the pest control industry.  Organophosphates (such as diazinon, malathion, chlorpyrifos, acephate, and safrotin) have been largely supplanted by pyrethroid insecticides and even newer classes of chemistry.  The results of this study apply only to OPs and not to all pesticides.
• The study did not attempt to prove a cause-effect relationship between OP pesticides and ADHD.  The study, for example, as the authors admit, could not fully rule out that some behavior factor common to ADHD children might cause them to have higher frequency of contact with OP pesticides. 
• The source(s) of OP exposure was not identified by the study.  Much of the exposures of children to these older pesticides likely come from dietary sources, especially since OP use by the pest control industry was already in decline during the years when the data was collected. 
• Any pest control company practicing IPM and safe application methods should at best be a minor and occasional source of pesticide exposure to customers.  Risk, or toxicity, of a pesticides is a product of two factors: (1) the toxicity of the pesticide and (2) how much exposure one has to that pesticide.  If labels are being followed, care is being taken to place pesticides only in places where people are unlikely to contact them, and lowest risk pesticides are being used, then the risk of harm to human health should be very small.

The results of this study do not negate the regulatory process that evaluates the safety of pesticides in use by the industry today.  Testing required by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for pesticides remains some of the most stringent consumer product testing in the world.  That said, no regulatory system can guarantee safety of any product or practice.  It's often said you can't prove absolute safety, because that's the same thing as trying to prove a negative--it's beyond the scope of experimental science.  We can only hope to guarantee a certain level of safety.  That is why a 100-fold safety factor is built into our current pesticide regulatory system, and why continual review of pesticides goes on between agency and manufacturers.  If a causal relationship is determined to exist between OP insecticides and ADHD, this new data will be taken into account by the EPA, and regulatory changes will undoubtedly be made, as they have for other pesticides.

If I were convinced that we could do IPM effectively without pesticides, I would certainly be a supporter of "no more pesticides".  But not all pesticides are equally risky, and the reality is that pesticides can be useful and even essential tools in our competition with pests. 

Until we find even safer ways to control pests, I will continue to study the use of pesticides, teach and preach pesticide safety, and recommend their use.  And in the meantime, if you really want to protect your health... cut back on the nachos. : )

PMPs ride bikes

Last week I included a note about riding in the Sam's Club MS 150 bicycle ride, in support of research efforts to fight multiple sclerosis.  Well, I'm happy to report that my wife Heather and I rode and finished the two-day, 159 mile ride across the rolling prairie north of Dallas and Fort Worth.  Thanks to all of you who supported me with donations to the National Multiple Sclerosis Society.  We came away with sore legs and shoulders, good memories, a great sense of accomplishment and a promise to ourselves to avoid our bicycle saddles for a few weeks.  We also made a few new friends, and ran into some old ones.  One of the teams riding last weekend was "Team Termidor", put together by Mike Toce, Regional Sales Manager for BASF, out of Southlake, TX.

It's refreshing to know that you have pest control colleagues that share your quirkiness.  Quirky in the sense they're willing to squeeze into tight shorts, put on funny helmets and pedal like mad for five hours for fun and a worthy cause (I didn't check to see how many of them shaved their legs). I'm sure many of you have similar stories of running into fellow PMPs at races, sporting events, and vacations far from home. If so, feel free to share in the comments section with the rest of us.