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Comment by bad_user | Hacker News Reader

No, non-organic has more residue of expected pesticides.

The often unspoken truth however is that many chemicals aren't tested for. For example copper sulfate, used as organic fungicide.

In other words conventional agriculture uses far more substances that the USDA tests for, a vast majority of them, whereas organic agriculture uses substances that aren't covered by USDA tests. Which should be obvious.

This doesn't mean that:

1. Organic agriculture uses less pesticides (bullshit, unless you're talking about GMOs, another hot subject)

2. Organic produce is in any way healthier

Both of these statements lack credible evidence. And we might actually find instances in which the substances used in organic agriculture are more unhealthy than their conventional equivalents.

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I think grouping all pesticides together and thinking about who uses "less pesticides" or "more pesticides" will lead to incorrect evaluations of pesticide safety.

Scientists should evaluate chemicals on a chemical-by-chemical basis. I found a study that talks about how using certain chemicals on the farm can lead to cancer for farm workers: "In summary, the epidemiologic evidence from a number of different studies now more convincingly shows that prostate cancer is related to pesticide use." This makes me think that, at the very least, organic produce is healthier for farm workers.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6276799/

edit: forgot a word.

Its not bullshit in the UK at least. Here is a mainstream article which cites government testing [1] Quote : "A Maximum Residue Level (MRL) for pesticides in foods is set by law and is below the safety level. In the most recent study, 3 percent of conventionally farmed food samples contained over the MRL for an individual pesticide compared with 0.4 percent of organic, while 44 percent contained residues at or below the MRL compared with 3 percent of organic."

Do you have any decent sources for your declamations ?

[1] https://www.bbc.co.uk/food/articles/organic_food_health

> For example copper sulfate, used as organic fungicide.

Why would one need to test for copper? The trace amounts of it that one would find are good for you. I mean, it's used for water piping in homes even.

That's silly, like saying breathing chlorine is safe because it's a component in table salt.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copper(II)_sulfate#Toxicologic...

No, it's like saying eating trace amounts of copper is safe as proven by the fact humans have been doing that since forever, and by the fact that health authorities endorse it (hospitals have copper piping).

The enormous and simple point you're missing: just like chlorine versus sodium chloride, copper sulfate is not the same thing as plain old copper.

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