Safety assessment of Bacillus thuringiensis-based products USING eye/ocular irritat ion on rabbits

To register with the national pesticide board,malaysia,a pesticide must undergo laboratory testing for short-term and long-term health effects. laboratory animals such as rabbits are tested with high doses of bacillus thuringiensis (bt) products to assess the potential to produce lesions or reversal effects on eyes. the objective of this study was to investigate the effect of bafog-1 (s) and ecobac-1 (ec) against young new zealand albino rabbit's eye or the potential of bt products to cause eye or ocular irritation. the test was conducted according to the guidelines of international organisation for standardisation 10993-10,test for irritation and sensitisation. the results showed that bafog-1 (s) is not an irritant to rabbits,whereas,ecobac-1 (ec) produced irritation that was reversal after 120 hr of instillation. the bt as an environmental-friendly microbial insecticide was generally non-toxic to human,domestic animals and vertebrates. therefore,bt is recommended to be used as a safe microbial insecticide for controlling bagworm in oil palm plantation.