FYI: Your Kale May Be Loaded With Pesticides, a New Report Confirms
The Environmental Working Group has released its 2019 Dirty Dozen foods list, which highlights the fruits and vegetables most contaminated with pesticides.
Strawberries topped the list for the fourth year in a row, spinach placed second, while kale jumped to the third spot (even though it didn’t make the list at all last year).
Some research links pesticides to adverse health effects, prompting researchers to recommend organic produce, or opting for foods on the Clean Fifteen list, when possible.
It’s no secret that fruits and vegetables are loaded with disease-fighting vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants. But even fresh, colorful produce carries its own risks, namely in the form of pesticides. That’s why, now more than ever, health-conscious shoppers are filling their carts with organic options.
But how do you choose the most crucial fruits and vegetables to seek out? Well, a 2019 report from the Environmental Working Group (EWG) is breaking down the top pesticide-ladened produce-known as the Dirty Dozen-to help steer you in the right direction.
In their annual Shopper’s Guide to Pesticides in Produce, the nonprofit, nonpartisan environmental organization found that strawberries top the list with the most pesticide residues for the fourth year in a row. Conventionally grown strawberries contained an average of 7.8 different pesticides per sample, and the dirtiest strawberry had up to 23 different pesticides on it, according to EWG’s research.
Kale came out of nowhere on the Dirty Dozen in the third spot, even though it did not make the list at all last year. “Despite its popularity, kale hasn’t been tested by the U.S. Department of Agriculture in about a decade,” says Carla Burns, MS, a research analyst at the EWG. The last time kale was tested, about 76 percent of samples had pesticide residue, she says. This time, a whopping 90 percent contained residue, and the dirtiest piece of kale contained residue from 18 different pesticides. “The acres harvested of kale have increased, but we can’t pinpoint exactly why the pesticide residues have increased,” Burns says.
The full Dirty Dozen list of the most contaminated fruits and vegetables includes:
Strawberries
Spinach
Kale
Nectarines
Apples
Grapes
Peaches
Cherries
Pears
Tomatoes
Celery
Potatoes
For the report, the EWG analyzed tests from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and factored several measures into the rankings, including the number of pesticides found on each individual fruit or vegetable. The analysis included about 41,000 samples (even more than last year’s 39,000 samples), which were tested for pesticides after they had been prepared to be eaten. That means the pesticide counts were collected once the fruits and vegetables had been thoroughly washed and, when applicable, peeled.
Do pesticides really impact your health, though?
Pesticides include insecticides, fungicides, herbicides, rodenticides, and other chemicals used to protect plants from diseases. While much more research needs to be done to truly understand the role these chemicals play in overall health when ingested, the existing research shouldn’t be swept under the rug. “It’s really important for people to pay attention to this,” says Nneka Leiba, MPH, director of EWG’s healthy living science program.
For instance, a report from the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends limiting pesticides in children as much as possible due to an association between pesticide ingestion and brain development risks during pregnancy and early childhood.
What’s more, consuming a diet rich in organic foods (aka, fewer pesticides) has also been linked to a decreased cancer risk. One 2018 study published in JAMA Internal Medicine analyzed the diets of nearly 70,000 French adults and found that those who ate organic foods more often had 25 percent less cancers than those who didn’t eat organic, including breast, prostate, colorectal, and skin cancers.
While specific pesticides have been studied closely, researchers know far less about how a mixture of these chemicals adversely affect our health, according to a 2016 review of research published in the journal Frontiers of Public Health.
Does that mean you need to stop eating all Dirty Dozen foods?
You might hear people say that you’d have to eat a ridiculous amount of strawberries or kale to increase your health risks, but Leiba points out that, realistically, people aren’t just eating one of the foods on the list-they’re likely eating several. And that can add up when it comes to pesticide exposure.
Still, she stresses that you shouldn’t completely avoid non-organic produce if that’s all that’s available (or all that you can afford) or toss out the stuff in your fridge if it happens to fall on the Dirty Dozen list. Produce as a whole has a lot of health benefits, Leiba says, which is why “all adults and children should eat more fruits and vegetables in general, whether conventional or organic.”
Still, it’s important to do the best you can until researchers have a more solid understanding of the health risks linked to pesticide consumption. That also includes shopping from EWG’s Clean Fifteen list, or the top list of produce that has been found to contain the least pesticide residues.
The EWG’s list of the Clean Fifteen produce includes:
Avocados
Sweet corn
Pineapples
Frozen sweet peas
Onions
Papayas
Eggplants
Asparagus
Kiwis
Cabbages
Cauliflower
Cantaloupes
Broccoli
Mushrooms
Honeydew melons
If you can’t memorize or carry around the Dirty Dozen and Clean Fifteen lists with you when you hit the grocery store, keep this in mind, per Leiba: In general, produce with a thin skin is more likely to contain more pesticides. “The thinner the skin, the easier it is for pesticides to get into it,” she explains. That’s why produce with thicker skin, like avocados and pineapples, tends to be a safer bet.
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