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The report does show that residues exceeding the tolerance were detected in 0.25 percent of the samples tested. For baby food-included for the first time in this report - the data showed that no residues were found that exceeded the tolerance levels."

In other words, this report found that 99.75 percent of samples tested contained residues well below EPA's "safe level."  Wow, that's an impressive success rate! It's a very strong indicator that U.S. consumers have nothing to fear from trace pesticides on their food.  

What about the 0.25 percent that had levels above EPA standards? Consumers need not fear even those.  Such slight exceedances have no public health impact because EPA standards are exceedingly stringent so that even a child could be exposed at levels thousands of times higher without ill effect.

For example, a research paper by University of Texas Professor Frank Cross highlights findings from number of studies showing that the EPA's risk estimates overstate pesticide exposure by as much as 99,000 to 463,000 times actual exposure.

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