Organophosphate induced chronic neurotoxicity: Health, environmental and risk exposure issues in developing nations of the world

Abstract

Organophosphate insecticides account for about half of all the insecticides used in the world and have found very wide applications in agriculture and in household vector control. Exposures of human populations to a wide variety of organophosphates have generated profound concerns about their
neurotoxic consequences. Among these concerns are their potential impacts on children and exposures to the neurodegenerative diseases associated with advancing age. This paper therefore tends to make a review of the health, environmental and other risk exposure issues of organophosphates especially in Africa and other developing nations of the world where data abound to
show that many agents considered toxic and banned in many parts of the industrialized world are still in use. This paper also makes recommendations on the way out of this menace.