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IOM Climate Change, the Indoor Environment and Health - 2011.pdf

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Climate Change, the Indoor Environment, and Health INFECTIOUS AGENTS AND PESTS 171 Once introduced into the home environment, pesticide residues may persist for years beyond the time of application, as demonstrated by evidence of banned compounds, such as DDT, in residential dust samples (Julien et al., 2008; Stout et al., 2009). Integrated pest management (IPM) is a reasonable adaptation to increasing populations of pests, but many families lack the education or resources to implement the changes that will be needed. Residents of multifamily urban dwellings where pesticides are commonly used may have little control over the pesticides used in their buildings. Changes in Vector Distribution Changes in patterns of infestation in the outdoor environment may affect indoor air quality. Milder and shorter winters are expected to increase the geographic distribution of pests, such as mosquitoes and insects that attack agricultural crops (Quarles, 2007). Outbreaks of West Nile virus, carried by mosquitoes, in 2001–2005 correlated with increasing temperature and rainfall, and this leads to the expectation that such outbreaks will increase with climate change. Others have drawn attention to how outbreaks of disease, such as dengue fever and possibly malaria, could result from climate change (Girman, 2010; Hales et al., 2002; Randolph and Rogers, 2000). The change in vector distribution and increasing threats to the agriculture industry are expected to result in increased use of agricultural chemicals (Boxall et al., 2009). As outdoor pesticide applications increase in an attempt to control increasing distribution of pests, indoor levels of these contaminants could rise. Pesticides applied in the outdoor environment do not remain outdoors but can find their way indoors through air exchange or can be brought in on clothing, skin, and especially shoes. People who live close to agricultural operations that increase their use of chemicals to control insect infestation may be at particularly high risk (Ward et al., 2006). In orchard-producing areas of Washington and Oregon, pesticide levels in house dust have been associated with distance from agricultural fields (Lu et al., 2000; McCauley et al., 2001), and pesticide metabolites in urine increased with proximity to the fields and during the pesticide-application season (Lu et al., 2000). Levels of pesticides metabolites have been higher in the urine of agricultural children than in the urine of children who reside in nonagricultural communities (Lambert et al., 2005; Lu et al., 2000). In countries where malaria is endemic, the residential ban on applications of DDT is being lifted. In 2006, the World Health Organization and the US Agency for International Development endorsed indoor DDT spraying to control malaria (WHO, 2009). The increasing distribution of pests associated with climate change will result in increased measures to control Copyright © National Academy of Sciences. All rights reserved.

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