Overall, I stand behind my story, “Harvesting
Poison” (HCN, 9/29/03: Harvesting Poison). While the
Washington Department of Agriculture has done some work to address
the safety of illegal farm workers, these people remain a largely
invisible, and neglected, workforce.
Reading Mr.
Zamora’s letter, one might think the two of us were in
different rooms when our interview took place. But I believe what
he told me supports what I wrote in the article. I have a direct
quote from Zamora, stating, “We’re a police agency, we
should be looking out for problems.”
The observation
that Zamora sees his job as a “personal struggle” was
my own. I based it on his personal encounter with pesticide
drifting onto his son’s playground, and on the pressure he
has gotten for attempting to enforce pesticide regulations. The
statement about the poor enforcement of the Worker Protection
Standard was supported by many people I interviewed, including
Zamora. He told me, “It’s not uncommon to see growers
violating re-entry,” adding, “people aren’t used
to having someone enforce the laws.”
Critics have
also questioned my claim that 800 to 1,000 farm workers die from
poisoning each year. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration produced
this estimate, and it appeared in the May 1, 1987, Federal
Register. In 1996, when Yale University’s John Wargo wrote
Our Children’s Toxic Legacy, this was the most recent such
statistic. I could find nothing more current. The Bureau of Labor
Statistics tracks injuries and deaths resulting from farming, but
it does not report on fatal illnesses such as those caused by
long-term exposure to chemicals.
I would like to correct
two errors. First, I’d stated that Zamora’s father was
an immigrant; in fact, his father’s parents came here from
Mexico. Second, Zamora has a doctorate in plant science, not in
botany. His bachelor’s degree is in botany.
Rebecca
Clarren
Portland, Oregon
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline The author responds.
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