The review of pesticide hazards with emphasis on insecticide resistance in arthropods of health risk importance

Considering the importance of environmental health and the role of pesticides as the major method in controlling hygienic pests and their hazards for environment and human health as well as development of insecticide resistance in arthropods, we reviewed the hazards of chemical methods in pest control and compared them with those of other methods in regard to insecticide resistance. The aim of this study was to sort and investigate the hazards of chemical compounds used for pest control.

This was a review article. Using keywords such as: ecotoxicology, insecticide resistance, pesticide residue environment and hazardous material environment, we searched Databases of Ovid, Pub Med, Web of Science, Medline, EBM Cochrane Database of Systematic Review and SID to find articles in the journals of our country and international journals. We found 552 articles and reviewed their titles and abstracts. Some of the articles were not related to our study and were excluded and our conclusion and analysis were based on the selected eligible articles.

The most important findings of this study were classification of adverse effects of pesticides on environment and development of resistance to these compounds and mechanisms of resistance in different arthropods. Resistance can lead to use of increased doses of pesticides which in turn, can result in more environmental pollution. The adverse effects of application of pesticides on environment are very serious. These adverse effects include insecticide resistance which may result in, control failure over hygienic pests and vectors of human diseases.

Environmental control methods by using environmental sanitary measures can destroy the breeding places of arthropods and decrease their population. Use of environmental control methods, instead of application of pesticides, can keep the environment safe and healthy and result in the improvement of the health of the human communities which is one of the main aims of the health organizations.