The Dutch food and product safety board has stopped ‘dozens’ more
poultry farms from sending their eggs to market because they may be
contaminated with the pesticide fipronil. Tests for traces of the
pesticide, used to control lice in poultry, are now being carried out on
eggs, hens and chicken manure at several dozen farms, the NVWA said in a
statement.
On Monday, the NVWA shut down seven poultry farms after fipronil was found in samples of eggs.
The chemical is primarily used as an insecticide, particularly to kill
fleas, and is classed as a ‘moderately hazardous pesticide’ by the World
Health Organisation.
In the Netherlands it is banned in the poultry sector. The NVWA, which
took the action after a tip-off from the Belgian authorities, said in a
statement there is no danger to human health. According to regional
paper de Stentor, the contamination may have come from a pest control
company in Gelderland which used the pesticide to deal with chicken
lice.
The NVWA says it has not so far found concentrations of the chemical
which would prove a direct danger to human health. However, continued
consumption of eggs containing fipronil ‘could have damaging effect.
The anti-lice pesticide at the centre of an egg safety scandal in the
Netherlands may have been used on Dutch farms as early as June 2016, the
Volkskrant said on Wednesday.
The company at the centre of the scandal, Barneveld-based Chickfriend,
was treating poultry for lice last year and there is no reason to
believe that the product did not contain fipronil at that time, the
paper said.
The Dutch food and product safety board NVWA told the paper that eggs
containing the banned pesticide fipronil could have been sold in Dutch
shops since then, but said: ‘we have no way of checking because the eggs
have been eaten’.
Chickfriend is now thought to have bought the pesticide from a Belgian
supplier and investigators are now trying to find out if the Dutch firm
was aware the product, said to be based on natural oils such as
eucalyptus, contained fipronil. The pesticide is classed as ‘moderately
hazardous pesticide’ by the World Health Organisation.
Note EU-Digest: Reviewing
Chemicals Product Lists of chemical products sold in the EU reveals
Fipronil is among one of the many poisonous (to humans) products sold by
the US based company Dow Chemicals in the EU. The EU authorities and
local European governments need to do a better job at overcoming the
intense lobby efforts, of mainly US based companies, to sell harmful
products like Fipronil in the EU.
Read more: Dozens more egg producers shut down as pesticide scandal spreads - DutchNews.nl