France is a blessed country. After having counted 68 million doctors during the Covid crisis, then 68 million athletes during the Olympic Games, it now has 68 million toxicologists… Including 1.3 million (at last count) confident enough to sign a petition calling for the “immediate repeal” of the Duplomb law , even though it was voted through according to democratic rules, on the grounds that parliamentarians want to “make us eat poison”, and that this text would be “a dangerous act for all of humanity”.

The arguments being bandied about even in the public media attribute all sorts of harmful effects to acetamiprid, the name of the neonicotinoid insecticide that the law plans to reintroduce in a very restricted manner: it is said to be the cause of “cancers”, “child poisoning”, “obesity, type 2 diabetes”, “developmental delays”, and even a “holocaust among insects”.

How can we explain, then, that this same molecule remains authorized for agricultural use in the United States, Japan, Canada, Australia, the Asian and South American continents, as well as throughout the European Union, where its approval was recently renewed until 2033? How can we explain, above all, that it has not been banned for domestic use, and remains used in French homes, given that acetamiprid is present in 95 biocidal products?

The complex issue is legitimately causing public anxiety, torn between two hypotheses. Either the French “whistleblowers” are right: health authorities around the world are taking the risk of “poisoning people” in the name of “profit-making” linked to ”  intensive agriculture .” Or… they are wrong, but the tsunami of contradictory elements rashly launched into the public debate is clouding their understanding.

To shed light on the subject, Le Point delved into independent studies and the various opinions of the French National Agency for Food Safety (ANSES), the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), with the help of experts on the molecule. A complex, sometimes technical, and eminently political journey.

What is acetamiprid?

Used on many crops (leafy vegetables, citrus fruits, pome and nut fruits, beetroot, etc.), acetamiprid eliminates insect pests by attacking their nervous system. Like its neonicotinoid cousins—imidacloprid, clothianidin, thiamethoxam, and thiacloprid, banned in Europe for their devastating effects on bees—it works by targeting the nicotinic acetylcholine receptors in the insect’s nervous system, causing paralysis and death. But the similarity ends there.

Because acetamiprid, often lumped together with other “bee-killing” neonicotinoids in the public debate, does not have the same ecotoxicological profile at all, EFSA documents. No notable effects were observed on bees after chronic exposure (11 consecutive days). And its LD50, that is, the dose to which a group of insects must be exposed for half to die, and which corresponds to the acute poisoning dose, is set at 8.85 µg/bee by ingestion, and 9.26 µg/bee by contact.

For comparison, the LD50 of clothianidin is only 0.00379 µg/bee by ingestion, and 0.0275 µg/bee by contact. In short: clothianidin, banned in Europe in 2018, is 2,300 times more toxic by ingestion than acetamiprid, and 330 times more toxic by contact.

A handful of studies, which subjected rats to very high doses of acetamiprid for several weeks, have raised the possibility of a link with the development of cancer. But no study, health authorities emphasize, has observed carcinogenicity “under realistic conditions” of use. Nor has any effect been suggested in the human population. As part of the European renewal of the molecule, EFSA conducted an in-depth assessment of the toxicological properties of acetamiprid in 2024. It confirmed that it had found no evidence of genotoxicity or carcinogenicity.

As for its impact on bees, it is considered “comparable to that of other authorized insecticides,” explains ecotoxicologist Csaba Szentes of EFSA’s Ecotox team. “Even though it’s a neonicotinoid, according to the data, it’s not a bee killer,” he emphasizes.

Its toxicity is considered “moderate” for pollinating insects and aquatic environments, and negligible for birds (for which the LD50 exceeds 2,000 mg/kg). Above all, acetamiprid does not persist in the environment: its half-life in soil is less than 8 days, and 1 to 4 days in waterways – unlike certain molecules which can remain for several years. Its metabolites can persist there for longer and are therefore monitored, without really raising any concerns.

Why are so many actors worried?

Acetamiprid remains a potent insecticide. In 2024, during its last assessment, EFSA noted points of uncertainty. These mainly concern two areas, explains Marco Binaglia, toxicology team leader at EFSA, who led the work: developmental neurotoxicity and endocrine-disrupting properties.

Neonicotinoids, including acetamiprid, act on nicotinic acetylcholine receptors, which play a key role in nervous system development. “We focused particularly on developmental neurotoxicity, and we noted that the available studies had not been conducted according to modern guidelines, which now include more extensive testing,” the researcher explains.

“However, the available in vivo DNT [developmental neurotoxicity] study showed a reduction in the auditory startle response in young animals (a kind of lack of reactivity to an auditory stimulus). The problem with this study is that it did not allow conclusions to be drawn on a series of parameters that are particularly important for assessing motor activity and learning and memory functions in rodents,” he adds.

“Overall, we felt that the substance could indeed cause neurotoxic effects on development.” But without certainty… Which is why new studies, conducted according to the rules, have been requested.

Another point of vigilance raised: no assessment of the endocrine-disrupting properties of acetamiprid has been carried out using the most recent protocols (for example, tests on estrogen or androgen receptors), these methodologies being neither validated nor required at the time the molecule was renewed in 2018. “The current data are insufficient to conclude that there is no risk,” explains Marco Binaglia. The Japanese company that owns the molecule has already ordered these additional studies, the results of which are expected in 2026.

The agency also requested that sublethal effects (i.e., impacts on pollinator behavior, reproduction, or navigation at low doses) be better studied, such as metabolite toxicity.

Why, in this case, was the molecule not banned?

Because in toxicology, it is important to distinguish between “lack of certainty”… and certainty of a risk. “We have modified the toxicological thresholds very cautiously to account for gaps in the data on developmental neurotoxicity,” explains Marco Binaglia.

The acceptable daily intake (ADI), that is, the dose that a human can ingest every day, throughout their life, without running the slightest danger, has been considerably lowered. Usually set with a safety factor of 100 compared to the dose at which an effect is observed (the Noael, or dose without observable toxic effect), it now applies a safety factor of 500. “In 2016, we had an ADI of 0.025 mg per kilogram of body weight per day. It has been reduced to 0.005 mg/kg bw/day.”

Concretely, this means that all regulatory thresholds for acetamiprid residues in food, the famous MRLs (or maximum residue limits), have been revised so that this ADI is never reached, including by including the sum of acetamiprid and its main metabolite (IM-2-1).

Do independent studies not contradict EFSA’s opinion?

These independent studies were indeed taken into account, with EFSA conducting a detailed analysis of their methodology and conclusions, at the request of both the French government and the anti-pesticide organization PAN-Europe. In total, around twenty studies were evaluated by the expert panel, using a rigorous methodology – and partly led to the changes we have just outlined.

However, the methodological quality of these publications is very uneven, the agency underlines in its detailed opinion published in March 2024. Some are classified as presenting “a high risk of bias”. Several lack a detailed assessment of exposure, use data irrelevant to risk assessment, tested inappropriate concentrations, biasing the results… “The independence of a study is not a guarantee of its quality”, summarizes a former ANSES expert.

But we find it in the cerebrospinal fluid of children!

Among the data submitted by France was a 2022 Swiss study, indicating that the main breakdown metabolite of acetamiprid, IM-2-1 (and not acetamiprid itself) was detected in the cerebrospinal fluid of 13 out of 14 children (aged 3 to 18 years) being treated for leukemia and lymphomas and undergoing therapeutic lumbar punctures.

But this study, scrupulously analyzed by independent researchers, was not deemed admissible by EFSA. On the one hand, because it presents methodological biases. On the other hand, because the source of the presence of this metabolite was not investigated. Yet acetamiprid remains widely used in homes: anti-cockroach, anti-ant, anti-flea sprays for pets… According to ANSES, in 2020, more acetamiprid was sold in France for domestic use than for agricultural use. Without this raising any alarm…

Is the risk controlled?

EFSA is all the more confident given that the substance’s uses have been strictly regulated and, contrary to popular belief in the public debate, the French (like all Europeans) are not exposed to it much through food. In 2021, acetamiprid was detected in less than 3% of food samples analyzed in Europe, with average concentrations below 0.01 mg/kg, well below the MRLs. Chronic exposure of populations was estimated at 0.0005 mg/kg/day for adults and 0.001 mg/kg/day for children, well below the ADI, including the revised ADI.

As for the population’s exposure to acetamiprid, it is not known today. A highly publicized study , published in 2024, revealed that acetamiprid had been detected, in 2014, in the hair of 47.7% of the 222 children observed as part of the Elfe epidemiological monitoring cohort, with a median concentration of 0.06 pg/mg (picogram per milligram of hair, or 0.000 000 000 0006 g).

But since the sources were not investigated, it is completely unknown whether the detected traces came from agricultural residues or household biocides. No significant effect was detected on the children’s growth. The same imprecision concerns the sources of the traces of acetamiprid found in the hair, and in 17% of the urine, of 72 children living near La Rochelle, in an analysis conducted by an association, loudly relayed by the press…

This is why ANSES, which issues marketing authorizations for pesticides in France, has not withdrawn its marketing authorization for acetamiprid. “Its ban was a political decision,” its president, Benoît Vallet, confirmed to MPs.

What does the law passed by the Assembly provide?

The law does not provide for a straightforward reintroduction of acetamiprid—an idea torpedoed by the government itself. To avoid censure by the Constitutional Council in the name of the principle of non-environmental regression, the molecule’s use will remain highly regulated. Authorization can only be granted by decree, as an “exceptional” and “derogatory” measure, for a limited period and under strict conditions: the industry must be in a proven crisis situation and be committed to “a plan to seek alternatives.”

Are there any alternatives?

For most crops, alternatives to the use of acetamiprid have been found. But not for all… The sugar beet sector, in particular, remains vulnerable to aphid attacks and to competition from German beet growers, who spray acetamiprid on their own crops and now export it to France.

In the past six years, six sugar factories have already closed in France. Another threatened crop: hazelnuts, threatened by the weevil worm and the brown marmorated stink bug, against which no alternative has proven effective. Today, 350 producers supply France with around 12,000 tons of hazelnuts, barely a quarter of domestic consumption. The remainder is massively imported from Turkey, and to a lesser extent from Italy and the United States… All of which use acetamiprid, and a host of other substances… which France bans.

A version of this article was originally posted at Le Point and is reposted here with permission. Any reposting should credit both the GLP and original article. Find Le Point on X @LePoint