Scientists Find a Better Way To Wash Pesticides Off Your Apples (cnet.com)

According to a new study, the best way to reduce pesticides from your supermarket apple is to use a baking soda solution. The discovery was made by a team of scientists from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. They compared the effectiveness of plain tap water, a commercial bleach solution and a baking soda/water mix in removing pesticides from apples. CNET reports: The scientists started with organic Gala apples and applied the fungicide thiabendazole and the insecticide phosmet before testing the different washing liquids. "The baking soda solution was the most effective at reducing pesticide," a release on the study notes. "After 12 and 15 minutes, 80 percent of the thiabendazole was removed, and 96 percent of the phosmet was removed, respectively." The researchers say the industry-standard approach of washing fruit in a bleach solution for two minutes after harvest is not an effective way to completely remove pesticides. They also found the fungicide thiabendazole penetrated into the apple peel much more than the insecticide. Apple lovers would need to remove the peel to also get rid of the pesticide that wasn't washed off with the baking soda solution. The researchers published the findings this week in the American Chemical Society's Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry.

Comments

Dose

[JBMcB]

Any ill effects from the pesticide or fungicide in low doses? No? No chronic effects at low doses, either? No bio accumulation?

Then I don't care.

Re:Dose

[LeftCoastThinker]

The old adage still holds true: The dose makes the poison.

These days we have a slew of jokers who failed high school chemistry and never had the brains for anything like organic chemistry in college, and these folks run around freaking out that you might get a few micrograms of a harmless pesticide or fungicide, whereas eating a slightly moldy spot in an apple probably gives you a much larger dose of cytotoxins, and insect penetration of fruit often leads to bacterial contamination, sometimes with something serious like salmonella or E. coil that can kill you.

But no, they rant against the harmless pesticides and fungicide out of complete ignorance... We need a law against public health statements by people without having the proper education in chemistry and biology (for both sides of the argument). Less hysteria, more science.

Re:Dose

[ShanghaiBill]

I certainly don't care enough to try washing my Apples in a commercial bleach solution.

This research is not aimed at consumers. It is aimed at fruit processors. They currently wash with a bleach solution, partly to remove chemicals, but mostly to kill bacteria such as salmonella, before shipping the fruit to the grocery store.

Methodology does not represent real life

[Tony Isaac]

The study started with organic, pesticide-free apples. The researchers sprayed the pesticides on the apples, then washed them off with the various solutions.

This method does not really mimic real life, where pesticides are sprayed on plants repeatedly over periods of weeks or months. In real life, some of the pesticides would soak into the apples, where it wouldn't be possible to wash them off using ANY solution.

Even Better Method

[prefec2]

Buy apple without poison on them. Yes I know, the organic apples are more expensive and some people have the odassity to sell you apples with spots (not that they taste worse, often they taste better). And yes if all would do that, you could not have large monocultures anymore making the apples more expensive. Still you do not have to eat poison and maybe we have a chance to get our insects back, which could increase the yield.