Pesticide lung: a pilot investigation of fruit-growers and farmers during the spraying season.

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Abstract
A fruit-grower with large, atypical lung infiltrations and lung fibrosis triggered off an investigation of fruit-growers during the spraying season. An interview was carried out with a Wright peak flow meter test and an X-ray examination of the chest. No fewer than 156 spray preparations were used by the group; individual fruit-growers used 3-27. In connection with spraying, 41% of subjects had one or other type of symptom; peak flow was reduced in 19% and X-ray changes were seen in 24%. A questionnaire was returned by 132 of 235 farmers. Of these, 60 had worked with biocides. A non-significant higher frequency of symptoms was found among those who had used biocides. The results indicated that biocides (or pesticides) gave rise to a lung disease, biocide lung, which comprised pneumonia, radiologically demonstrable by more or less transient round infiltrations, and chronic progressive lung fibrosis.