Dicamba Is One Of The Widely Used Herbicides Across The U.S. With Environmental Protection Agency Granting Its Use
Dicamba is a newly approved herbicide used to control broadleaf, wetland weeds, and dicamba-coated annuals (i.e., wheatgrass). In the last few years, Dicamba has gained FDA approval for use on five crops: alfalfa, broccoli, cotton, cabbage, and mustard. There's a growing sentiment among Extension experts and academic researchers that the new dicamba herbicide is prone to going off target and volatilizing, especially if certain environmental factors are present.
According to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration,
Dicamba is "generally recognized as safe" for use on non-growing
vegetables and fruits except for tomatoes (where there is an existing risk to
renal tubular necrosis in patients with pre-existing kidney disease, according
to the European Medicines Agency). The agency says it's "not recommended
for use on trees or plants in the seed or flower phase," specifically
referring to the atrazine herbicide. The atrazine herbicide is registered for
use on all crops in Europe except for maize, which is protected due to a
European Union directive. The herbicide is "generally recognized as
safe" for use on potatoes and tobacco, according to the European
Commission. The United States FDA does not consider atrazine unsafe.
However, the European Medicines Agency says there
are known indications of the potential carcinogenicity of the ingredient
dicamba and the evidence of potential genotoxicity of laboratory animals.
Dicamba is pretreatment with an herbicide that contains diclofenac, which is
structurally similar to the carbofuran herbicide carbofuran. Studies in
pregnant rats have shown that the insecticide atrazine is metabolized into free
radicals that may be responsible for cell line abnormalities and, consequently,
cancer. The environmental protection agency has deemed that sufficient evidence
does not support the claims that atrazine is unsafe. Although many countries
are skeptical about the use of dicamba, some countries have allowed its use.
For instance, in October 2020, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
has cleared the use of the chemical dicamba as a weed killer sold by Bayer AG.
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