Children’s Livers Can’t Cope With Pesticides —Wellness Wire

For years it had been thought that by two years old, children developed a liver enzyme that helped  them to protect against organophosphate pesticides. The enzyme, called paraoxonase, plays a key role in helping the body neutralize and eliminate organophosphate pesticides. Instead, a new study has found, it takes children until age 7 to come close to adult levels of paraoxonase, and even then it isn’t at the same level as adults. In addition to changes with age, paraoxonase also varied by a child’s genetics. The study was published in Environmental Health Perspectives.