Study: Washing fruit before consumption does not remove pesticides

According to a new report, washing fruit before eating it does not remove pesticides – and the only way to avoid ingesting these chemicals is to peel the fruit.

Using special Raman imaging technology, the scientists studied how pesticides affected apples. They found “a distribution of pesticides in the peel and flesh of the apple, confirming that the pesticides penetrate through the peel into the flesh,” according to the report published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society. Nano letters.

“The risk of pesticide ingestion via the fruit cannot therefore be avoided by simply washing it, but only by peeling it.”

The study’s authors said their aim was not to scare anyone about the presence of pesticides in food, but rather to provide guidance on how to avoid them.

“This study, which is in the broad field of food safety, attempts to provide health advice to consumers,” said Dongdong Ye, a professor at the Chinese School of Materials and Chemistry at Anhui Agricultural University and author of the study, according to The Guardian.

“Instead of creating unnecessary fears, research suggests that peeling removes almost all pesticide residues, unlike the commonly recommended washing.”

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As the report states, “pesticides cannot be completely removed by conventional fruit cleaning methods.” However, “taking into account the fact that the pulp layer lost during peeling was much thicker than 30 μm, which was confirmed by ultra-depth microscopy, we believe that peeling can effectively avoid the hazards of pesticides in the epidermis and epidermal pulp, thereby reducing the probability of pesticide ingestion.”

According to the latest report from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, “Before approving the use of pesticides on food, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) sets limits that determine how much pesticide can be used on food during cultivation, processing, and storage, and how much of it can remain on the food that reaches the consumer.”

The report found: “When pesticide residues are found in food, they are almost always at levels below the tolerance or maximum amount of a pesticide that can remain in or on a food.”

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The EPA regularly reviews the permissible tolerance levels for pesticides “to ensure that the tolerances accurately reflect the actual or expected residue levels in foods.”

“This re-examination, combined with a review of other routes of exposure to this pesticide (via drinking water and residential use of the pesticide), will provide ‘reasonable assurance that no harm will result from overall exposure.'”