Representatives Chellie Pingree (D-Maine) and Anna Paulina Luna (R-Florida) launched the Paraquat Prevention Act final week. The invoice would cancel all registered makes use of of paraquat and completely prohibit its reregistration. It might additionally guarantee no ranges of paraquat residue are tolerated in meals.

The laws builds on a Vermont ban on the sale and use of paraquat, which was signed into legislation in Might. Whereas Vermont was the primary U.S. state to ban using the herbicide, paraquat is already banned in over 70 international locations, together with Brazil, China, and each nation of the European Union.

Critics of paraquat level to the mounting scientific proof that hyperlinks paraquat publicity to the danger of Parkinson’s illness. By persevering with to permit using paraquat, American farmers and farmworkers are left “unprotected,” in response to a press launch from Pingree’s workplace.