Exploring Health Canada's pesticide laboratory’s role in the Water monitoring program for pesticides

Transcript

Transcript

Health Canada's Water Monitoring Program for Pesticides, led by the Pest Management Regulatory Agency, collects water samples across Canada to determine if there are possible risks to human health and the environment, from pesticides that may be found in Canadian waters.

Scientists carefully collect water samples from a network of surface water and groundwater sites across Canada. These samples are sent to the pesticide laboratory for testing.

At the pesticide lab our scientists inspect the water samples. Every sample is then filtered, documented and stored in a freezer at minus 80 Celsius until it is time for analysis.

Every step at the laboratory follows strict procedures to ensure the delivery of highest quality analytical results possible.

The scientists need to accurately identify which pesticides may be present in the water sample and determine their concentrations. To do this they use commercial pure pesticides, known as standards, to compare with the water sample.

The scientists use an instrument called a Liquid Chromatography- Tandem Mass spectrometry for analysis.

This instrument is incredibly sensitive and can detect 1 part per trillion of a pesticide in a sample. That's the equivalent of one drop of water in twenty Olympic-sized swimming pools!

Since this instrument is so sensitive, samples often need to be diluted. This helps the scientist get precise measurements of the pesticides.

The scientists check for close to 200 different pesticides in each water sample. Then they can calculate how much of each pesticide is present by comparing with the standards.

From 2022-2023 our scientists analyzed over 3,900 samples from watersheds and waterbodies across Canada.

The work our scientists do helps Health Canada make timely evidence-based decisions on pesticides to protect the health and safety of Canadians and their environment.

Scientific data and more information on this program can be found on Health Canada's website.