How toxic is deltamethrin to humans?

Deltamethrin is the most toxic of the pyrethroid insecticides, with contact and stomach action, rapid contact action, strong knockdown power, no fumigant or systemic action, and a repellent effect on some pests at high concentrations. So is deltamethrin highly toxic to humans?

1. Is deltamethrin highly toxic to humans?

Deltamethrin belongs to the moderately toxic class. Skin contact can cause irritation symptoms, with red papules appearing. In acute poisoning, mild cases have headache, dizziness, nausea, vomiting, loss of appetite and fatigue, while severe cases can also develop muscle fasciculations and convulsions. It has an irritant effect on human skin and eye mucous membranes, and is highly toxic to fish and bees. Insects that have developed resistance to DDT show cross-resistance to deltamethrin.

2. Methods of use

For the control of agricultural pests, it is mainly applied as an emulsifiable concentrate sprayed with water, used on cotton, vegetables, fruit trees, tea bushes, oil crops, tobacco, sugarcane, dryland grain crops, forest trees, flowers and other crops, to control various aphids, cotton bollworm, cotton pink bollworm, imported cabbageworm, diamondback moth, tobacco cutworm, beet armyworm, yellow squash beetle, striped flea beetle, peach fruit borer, oriental fruit moth, peach pyralid moth, citrus leafminer, tea geometrid, tea tussock moth, slug moths, tea leaf roller, soybean pod borer, bean pod borer, bean webworm, bean hawk moth, sesame hawk moth, sesame stem borer, small white butterfly, spotted pierid, tobacco budworm, sugarcane borers, armyworm in wheat fields, forest caterpillars, slug moths and others, generally at 0.5-1 gram of active ingredient per mu. For boring pests, the pesticide should be applied before the larvae bore into the plant.

For the control of storage pests, emulsifiable concentrate sprayed with water is mainly used; for insect-proof disinfection of raw grain and seeds, the effective period is generally about half a year. It is strictly forbidden to use it in commercial grain warehouses and on commercial grain. For insect-proof disinfection of empty warehouses, equipment, transport vehicles and packaging materials, the spray method is generally used.

For the control of public health pests, wettable powder mixed with water is mainly used for residual spraying, or brushed onto the surfaces where public health pests move and rest. For cockroaches, a poison bait can also be prepared for trapping and killing. Emulsifiable concentrate must not be used for controlling public health pests.

3. Scope of application

Deltamethrin is suitable for a very wide range of crops and can be widely used on cruciferous vegetables, gourd vegetables, legume vegetables, solanaceous vegetables, asparagus, rice, wheat, corn, sorghum, rapeseed, peanut, soybean, sugar beet, sugarcane, flax, sunflower, alfalfa, cotton, tobacco, tea bushes, apple, pear, peach, plum, jujube, persimmon, grape, chestnut, citrus, banana, lychee, mango, forest trees, flowers, medicinal herb plants, grassland and many other plants.

Deltamethrin may be inhaled, ingested or absorbed through the skin, so protection must be taken during use.