Farmworkers fall ill

Thursday, September 27, 2007 5:59 PM CDT

RENO, Nev. (AP) — About 125 farm workers in western Nevada were treated at a rural medical center after being sickened by an agricultural chemical used on an adjacent field, authorities said.

Workers began feeling ill shortly after 8 a.m. Wednesday while working in an onion field owned by Peri & Sons Inc., about 65 miles southeast of Reno, said Jeff Page, Lyon County’s emergency manager. The company farms about 1,800 acres in the Mason Valley, according to its Web site.

Page said a nearby field had been treated Monday with chloropicrin, a fumigant used for agricultural pest and fungus control. It once was used as a chemical warfare agent during World War I.

Page said the chemical gives off gases that generally blow away, but a weather inversion that trapped cold air in the valley early Wednesday kept the fumes near the ground.

“This stuff is used on a regular basis in farming throughout the country,” he said. “Had we not had this inversion, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

Two workers were taken by ambulance to the South Lyon Medical Center, Page said. The others, mainly Hispanic workers, were transported by company buses. By early afternoon, all but one had been treated and released, said hospital administrator Joan Hall. The remaining patient was being held for observation and was expected to be released later in the day, she said.

“It’s all over. All the farm workers seem to be OK,” Hall said.

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