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From the San Jose Mercury News, July 12, 1994 MIAMI A possible link betweeen Parkinson's disease and a pesticide used until 1972 has been found by Miami doctors, whose research was published in Thursday's Annals of Neurology. "There was never any concrete evidence until this study about small groups of individuals with known Parkinson's disease, and the possible association with pesticides," said Dr. LOra Fleming, an epidemiologist at the Univesity of Miami who was involved in the study. "This is just a piece of the puzzle," said her colleague, Dr. Juan R. Sanchos-Ramos, a University of Miami neurologist. "I don't think we'll ultimately find that Parkinson's is caused by purely environmental causes." ..... Medical surveys of people with Parkinson's sugested that farmers, drinkers of well water, and those with history of pesticide exposure may be at increased risk for the disease. But until the Univesity of Miami research, no one had examined brain tissue of Parkinson's victims for pesticide residue. In examining the brains of 20 people with Parkinson;s, seven with Alzheimer's disease and 14 with neither disease, the researchers found small amounts of the pesticide Dieldrin in six of the Parkinson brains, one Alheimer's brain, and none of the control brains. Dick Lacey ([log in to unmask])