Chlorpyrifos pesticide is linked to Parkinsons in a 2025 recent study posted below. This toxin connects exposure to a 2.5-fold increase in Parkinson’s disease risk even when exposure occurred 10 to 20 years before diagnosis.

Standard treatments for Parkinsons involve putting medicines and supplements in the body. Results of this 2025 study indicate getting the toxins like Chlorpyrifos out of your body should be a treatment priority. This is one of hundreds of studies that link toxins to symptoms of Parkinsons.

Although you have likely never even heard of this toxin, agriculture application has been so extensive for decades. Most people have been exposed at one time or another either from eating contaminated foods, breathing air contaminated with chlorpyrifos and even drinking contaminated water. You do not have to live and work on a farm to be exposed.

Chlorpyrifos Pesticide Linked to Parkinsons

Mol Neurodegener. 2025 Dec 11;21(1):3. The pesticide chlorpyrifos increases the risk of Parkinson’s disease

Abstract

Background: Pesticides as a class have been associated with an increased risk of Parkinson’s disease (PD), but it is unclear which specific pesticides contribute to this association and whether it is causal. Since chlorpyrifos (CPF) exposure has been implicated as a risk factor for PD, we investigated its association to incident PD and if this association is biologically plausible using human, rodent, and zebrafish (ZF) studies.

Methods: The association of CPF with PD was performed using the UCLA PEG cohort (829 PD and 824 control subjects), the pesticide use report and geocoding the residence and work locations to estimate exposures. For the mammalian studies, 6 months old male mice were exposed to CPF by inhalation (consistent with human exposures) for 11 weeks and behavioral and stereological pathological analyses were performed. Transgenic ZF were utilized to determine the mechanism of CPF neurotoxicity.

Results: Long-term residential exposure to CPF was associated with more than a 2.5-fold increased risk of developing PD. Mice exposed to aerosolized CPF developed motor impairment, dopaminergic neuron loss, microglial activation, and an increase in pathological ?-synuclein (?-syn). Using ZF, we found that CPF-induced dopaminergic neuron loss was at least partially due to autophagy dysfunction and synuclein accumulation, as knocking down LC3 recapitulated the dopaminergic neuron loss and restoring autophagic flux or eliminating synuclein reduced neuronal vulnerability.

Conclusions: CPF exposure is associated with an increased risk of developing PD.

About Chlorpyrifos

Chlorpyrifos was first introduced to the American market in 1965. Its initial appeal came from its ability to target a wide range of insects using the application of a single product. This made it attractive for both agricultural and residential pest control.

In 2021, the EPA banned chlorpyrifos use on food. That decision was overturned in November 2023 by the U.S. Court of Appeals. Chlorpyrifos pesticide is once again legally permitted on food crops in the U.S.

Why does Chlorpyrifos have such a deleterious effect on the neurological system? It blocks an enzyme that regulates communication between and among nerve cells. When this enzyme is inhibited, the nervous system is not able to transmit normal signals. This creates the conditions associated with the symptoms of Parkinsons.

Robert Rodgers PhD
Founder 2004
Parkinsons Recovery ®
https://www.parkinsonsdisease.me
robert@parkinsonsrecovery.com