The results of a new study on 614 French vineyard workers in their 40s and 50s shows that there may be a link between a long-term exposure to pesticides and dementia.
The study participants, who had worked in their industry for at least 20 years, were divided into different groups: those who had never been exposed, directly exposed or indirectly exposed to pesticides throughout their career. Their intellectual skills were monitored over a period of 6 years with several different tests involving memory and recall, language retrieval, verbal skills and reaction time measurements. Capacities were assessed twice.
According to the results, workers exposed directly to pesticides were most likely to do worse on the second test. They were also the most likely group to achieve lower scores on both tests as well as in the Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE) which is used to test cognitive functioning and may indicate a person at risk of dementia. The researchers qualified this brain decline in MMSE “is particularly striking in view of the short duration of follow up and the relatively young age of the participants”.
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