Aluminium Phosphate
‘The EPA has undertaken preliminary investigations into the case and wishes to caution the general public not to patronize mobile vendors selling pesticide products containing the active ingredient Aluminium Phosphate, for the control of household pests such as bedbugs, rodents, cockroaches and flies.
‘The general public is hereby informed that Aluminium Phosphate is NOT registered for the control of bedbugs and other household pests and should NOT under any circumstance be purchased and used for such unapproved purposes. Rather, Aluminium phosphate is registered for RESTRICTED USE for the control of insect pests in stored grains ONLY and should be handled by persons certified by the EPA or certified pest control operators with the requisite training.’
The foregone suggest unambiguously that we have for a long time risked our lives by allowing the uncontrolled sale of very dangerous chemicals by unqualified persons in the name of pest control. Perhaps the fallouts have come in varying health conditions beyond our ken.
The fault, though, is not our making but those responsible for protecting us against the dangers posed by restricted chemicals. After all most of us do not know that some chemicals should be handled only by qualified persons. How come therefore that such chemicals are being sold by persons who hardly know what they are hawking besides the lone fact that they kill bedbugs or mosquitoes?
Until the above-mentioned warnings from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) were released in the form of a press release yesterday, even the lettered members of society did not know that some classes of chemicals are not to be handled by those who are not trained to do so let alone sold in the streets.
Yesterday we commented about the fatal poisoning of three siblings, a tragic event which triggered the EPA to come out with eye-opening facts about chemicals.
Following DAILY GUIDE’s visit to the family of the bereaved in Accra’s suburb of Abavana Down, Kotobabi yesterday, one clear issue came up. The killer chemical is in town and innocent persons would definitely buy it to fight bedbug infestation and likely suffer the fate of the family of the deceased kids.
The Nima Divisional Commander told DAILY GUIDE yesterday that the hawker of the killer chemical would be apprehended. Such an arrest could assist the police in tracing the source of the chemical against the backdrop of the fact that it is a restricted stuff.
So who are responsible for ensuring that restricted chemicals are treated as such and not allowed to be sold in slums where labels do not mean a thing to patrons of such insecticides and rodenticides.
The EPA warning adds that the restricted fumigants are meant for stored grains. That is a bit confusing because we are unable to reconcile the fact that the fumigant can be applied on stored grains yet lethal to humans. Can the treated grain be consumed as food or they can only be sowed for agricultural purposes.
There could be so much quantity of the aluminium phosphate laced pesticides in the country, especially, in the rural areas and unless a massive educational programme is rolled out, many lives could be lost. The EPA and the Food and Drugs Board have a lot of work to do. Â The time to act is now.