To evaluate county-level associations of 295 pesticides with prostate cancer in counties across the United States, researchers conducted an environment-wide association study using a 10- to 18-year lag time between exposure and prostate cancer incidence to account for the slow-growing nature of most prostate cancers.
Pesticide use between 1997-2001 and 2011-2015 were evaluated for prostate cancer outcomes. Similarly, pesticide use from 2002-2006 was analyzed for results from 2016-2020.
Among the 22 pesticides that showed consistent direct associations with prostate cancer incidence in both time-based analyses, there were three pesticides previously associated with prostate cancer; one of which was 2,4D, one of the most commonly used pesticides in the United States. The 19 candidate pesticides not previously associated with prostate cancer included 10 herbicides, several fungicides and insecticides, and one soil fumigant.
Four pesticides linked to prostate cancer cases have also been linked to prostate cancer deaths: three herbicides (trifluralin, chloransulam-methyl, and diflufenzopyr) and one insecticide (thiamethoxam). Only trifluralin is classified as a “probable human carcinogen” by the Environmental Protection Agency, while the other three are considered “unlikely to be carcinogenic” or have evidence of “noncarcinogenicity.”
Lead author Dr. D., of Stanford University School of Medicine. “This research highlights the importance of examining environmental exposures, such as pesticide use, to explain some of the geographic differences we observe in prostate cancer incidence and mortality across the United States,” said Simon John Christoph Soerensen. he said.
“Based on these findings, we can advance our efforts to identify risk factors for prostate cancer and try to reduce the number of men affected by this disease.”