April 25 (Reuters) – Heavy use of the world’s most popular herbicide, Roundup, could be linked to a range of health problems and diseases, including Parkinson’s, infertility and cancers, according to a new study.
The peer-reviewed report, published last week in the scientific journal Entropy, said evidence indicates that residues of “glyphosate,” the chief ingredient in Roundup weed killer, which is sprayed over millions of acres of crops, has been found in food.
Those residues enhance the damaging effects of other food-borne chemical residues and toxins in the environment to disrupt normal body functions and induce disease, according to the report, authored by Stephanie Seneff, a research scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Anthony Samsel, a retired science consultant from Arthur D. Little, Inc. Samsel is a former private environmental government contractor as well as a member of the Union of Concerned Scientists.
“Negative impact on the body is insidious and manifests slowly over time as inflammation damages cellular systems throughout the body,” the study says.
We “have hit upon something very important that needs to be taken seriously and further investigated,” Seneff said.
Environmentalists, consumer groups and plant scientists from several countries have warned that heavy use of glyphosate is causing problems for plants, people and animals.The EPA is conducting a standard registration review of glyphosate and has set a deadline of 2015 for determining if glyphosate use should be limited. The study is among many comments submitted to the agency.
Monsanto is the developer of both Roundup herbicide and a suite of crops that are genetically altered to withstand being sprayed with the Roundup weed killer.
These biotech crops, including corn, soybeans, canola and sugarbeets, are planted on millions of acres in the United States annually. Farmers like them because they can spray Roundup weed killer directly on the crops to kill weeds in the fields without harming the crops.
Roundup is also popularly used on lawns, gardens and golf courses.
H/T David Benowitz.
Flushing it all down our sluice ways to accumulate in southern waters causes Gohmertism.
That’s much too limited. In truth it causes Republicanism.
Normally, Iless, I like you, but not today. So, I will ignore your comment, because I think it is an equivalent of a racial slur.
Let’s get to the point. Monsanto and others want to control the big, general food supply. Monsanto has an advocate in the Supreme Court. Nestle want to “privatize” water. One of the big banks owns the water treatment in Birmingham, AL and it is causing problems. Commodity traders throttle the rice supply a few years back, causing a big shortage for folks that depend on that staple.
Roundup is bad stuff. Unfortunately, for most suburbanites, if it wasn’t around, they would have to put on garden gloves and pull weeds. Oh, my! Now, Roundup is everywhere. If you want to know why strawberries are so cheap….. Roundup! Now, Monsanto has to breed crop seed resistant to Roundup?
“Give me spots on the apples and save the birds and the bees……”
“…Farmers like them because they can spray Roundup weed killer directly on the crops to kill weeds in the fields without harming the crops…”
The argument starts to break down right there because these days more and more weeds have evolved sufficiently to resist Roundup.
http://www.motherjones.com/tom-philpott/2012/03/monsanto-scientists-superweeds-NPR
Note too that the crops mentioned – corn, soybeans, canola, sugarbeets – are all monoculture crops. Nature doesn’t grow things in monoculture. If you try to impose your will on Nature for the sake of “efficiency” and profits, then you must go to war with Nature by conducting chemical warfare.
And you will lose.
Is it true that the cost of growing soybeans has increased by 10 times since 1980? Might it be that the Monsanto’s of the world are only trying to incease the cost of food to obtain larger profits? Free markets aren’t free.
At this point, outrage fatigue gets the better of me.