Submission to the City of Edmonton IPM Review

The Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment (CAPE) submitted a brief to the City of Edmonton arguing that the current Integrated Pest Management (IPM) policy fails to adequately address human health risks. CAPE highlights that children are particularly vulnerable to pesticide exposure, which is linked to developmental deficits and childhood cancers, while adults face risks of Parkinson's disease and various cancers. The document criticizes Health Canada's Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA) for relying on industry-supplied data and failing to conduct timely re-evaluations of registered pesticides. CAPE recommends that Edmonton formalize a policy to eliminate routine toxic pesticide use in city-managed parks and for mosquito control, and implement a bylaw restricting non-essential pesticide use on residential and private lawns.

• The City of Edmonton's current Integrated Pest Management (IPM) policy lacks an "explicit acknowledgement of human health risk associated with exposure to pesticides," and its 2015 herbicide ban contains exemptions for sports fields, cemeteries, golf courses, and high-profile parks that "undermine the protection of human health."
• Children are identified as the most at-risk group for pesticide exposure, with potential health impacts including "increased risks of low birth weight and pre-term births in babies," "deficits in cognitive and motor development," "hormonal (endocrine) disruption," and childhood cancers such as "leukemia and brain cancer."
• Adult exposure to pesticides is associated with an increased risk of "Parkinson’s disease, asthma and obstructive lung disease, Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), diabetes, and cancers such as non-Hodgkin lymphoma, leukemia and cutaneous melanoma."
• CAPE argues that Health Canada’s Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA) process is "not reliably health-protective" because it relies on industry-supplied studies that are often not peer-reviewed, fails to test formulated products rather than just active ingredients, and is "far behind" in conducting required 15-year re-evaluations of registered pesticides.
• The document recommends that the City of Edmonton formalize a policy to "eliminate its own routine use of toxic pesticides in City-managed parks and green spaces and for larval mosquito control" and enact a bylaw restricting non-essential uses of toxic pesticides on "residential and privately owned lawns and gardens."

APA

Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment (2019). Submission to the City of Edmonton IPM Review. https://cape.ca/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/CAPE-brief-to-Edmonton-IPM-review-February-2019.pdf

Chicago

Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment. Submission to the City of Edmonton IPM Review. 2019. https://cape.ca/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/CAPE-brief-to-Edmonton-IPM-review-February-2019.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite press release |author=Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment |title=Submission to the City of Edmonton IPM Review |date=10 February 2019 |url=https://cape.ca/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/CAPE-brief-to-Edmonton-IPM-review-February-2019.pdf |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@misc{canadianassociationofphysiciansfortheenvironment2019submission, author = {{Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment}}, title = {{Submission to the City of Edmonton IPM Review}}, publisher = {Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment}, year = {2019}, month = feb, url = {https://cape.ca/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/CAPE-brief-to-Edmonton-IPM-review-February-2019.pdf}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }