Common Weed Killer Glyphosate Increases Risk of Cancer By 41 Percent, Study Says (theguardian.com) 162
A broad new scientific analysis of the cancer-causing potential of glyphosate herbicides, the most widely used weedkilling products in the world, has found that people with high exposures to the popular pesticides have a 41% increased risk of developing a type of cancer called non-Hodgkin lymphoma. The Guardian reports: The evidence "supports a compelling link" between exposures to glyphosate-based herbicides and increased risk for non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL), the authors concluded, though they said the specific numerical risk estimates should be interpreted with caution. Monsanto maintains there is no legitimate scientific research showing a definitive association between glyphosate and NHL or any type of cancer. Company officials say the EPA's finding that glyphosate is "not likely" to cause cancer is backed by hundreds of studies finding no such connection.
But the new analysis could potentially complicate Monsanto's defense of its top-selling herbicide. Three of the study authors were tapped by the EPA as board members for a 2016 scientific advisory panel on glyphosate. The new paper was published by the journal Mutation Research /Reviews in Mutation Research, whose editor in chief is EPA scientist David DeMarini. [...] The study authors said their new meta-analysis evaluated all published human studies, including a 2018 updated government-funded study known as the Agricultural Health Study (AHS). Monsanto has cited the updated AHS study as proving that there is no tie between glyphosate and NHL. In conducting the new meta-analysis, the researchers said they focused on the highest exposed group in each study because those individuals would be most likely to have an elevated risk if in fact glyphosate herbicides cause NHL.
But the new analysis could potentially complicate Monsanto's defense of its top-selling herbicide. Three of the study authors were tapped by the EPA as board members for a 2016 scientific advisory panel on glyphosate. The new paper was published by the journal Mutation Research /Reviews in Mutation Research, whose editor in chief is EPA scientist David DeMarini. [...] The study authors said their new meta-analysis evaluated all published human studies, including a 2018 updated government-funded study known as the Agricultural Health Study (AHS). Monsanto has cited the updated AHS study as proving that there is no tie between glyphosate and NHL. In conducting the new meta-analysis, the researchers said they focused on the highest exposed group in each study because those individuals would be most likely to have an elevated risk if in fact glyphosate herbicides cause NHL.
I'll just leave this here. (Score:5, Funny)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
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There are a lot of things that are safe for me to drink but there is no way I would drink them. My own urine is safe for me to drink, but if you want me to drink it I'm going to have the same response as this guy. I know play doh is safe to eat, but if you ask me if I want to eat a jar of it, I'm going ot tell you know because I'm not an idiot. That doesn't make it unsafe, that makes your request stupid.
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But what if we invited you in for an interview about a product that your company is making which is saving millions of lives every year? Would you agree to drink it then if that was the bait that was used for the ambush?
It is totally unreasonable for you to decline to drink a liquid that we say is your product, even if it is an industrial chemical produced and bottled on an assembly line that wasn't designed, cleaned or inspected for producing products intended for human consumption.
Re:I'll just leave this here. (Score:4, Insightful)
It depends entirely on whether I went around in previous interviews touting the fact that my product was safe enough to drink.
In that case, saying, "OK, let see you do it," is a reasonable request. Especially if the product is going to be used on a basic foodstuff that is in practically everything people eat.
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This logic that the only way to back up claims something is safe to drink is to drink it anytime someone asks is ridiculous. If someone wants to sell a medical product that can cure a disease do they have to infect themselves with the disease each time someone asks just to prove they "really" believe it?
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Excrement is used on a basic food stuff, it doesn't mean it's part of a healthy and balanced diet.
Incorrect, silly man.
Excrement is sometimes used on the soil from which basic foodstuffs are grown. It is rapidly broken down by the elements and by biological soil processes. And then its component chemicals are filtered through fungi and the plants' root systems, before being built up into new chemical compounds that become basic foodstuffs.
Whereas glyphosate (and the accompanying chemicals, which together are far more harmful than glyphosate alone) are sprayed directly onto the basic foodstuffs.
See the d
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This is a silly branch of argument you have descended down. Almost nothing used in "organic" farming would meet you criteria. Go ahead and chug some copper sulfate and get back to us.
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Whereas glyphosate (and the accompanying chemicals, which together are far more harmful than glyphosate alone) are sprayed directly onto the basic foodstuffs.
My understanding is the surfactants used with glyphosate are untested and may well be the cause of cancer rather then the glyphosate.
Many years ago I took a pesticide applicators course (forestry) and it was highly stressed to keep exposure to a minimum. The instructor told the story of working with people who would drink 2-4-D to show it was safe and commented that they were all dead of cancer.
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Are you referring to the KFC gravy bowl?
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> My own urine is safe for me to drink, but if you want me to drink it I'm going to have the same response as this guy.
Then maybe you shouldn't have a job hocking the safety of your own urine-fertilized products, while asserting it's safe to consume the urine in the same breath. The request isn't stupid, it obviates the insincerity and is uncomfortably decisive.
Re:I'll just leave this here. (Score:5, Insightful)
Poop is a common fertilizer in "organic" farming, yet it is not safe to consume. I don't see why being able to drink something used in agriculture is any sort of standard for safety.
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You're dead wrong on several counts. Not only is composted manure safe to consume (not that you'd want to), but can also easily be washed off before use. Glycophosphates can't be removed through washing or cooking.
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Poop is a common fertilizer in "organic" farming
Is it really? Or is it just an input for composting or other processes that get rid of the inevitable pathogens before you actually start growing plants with it?
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Yes, it's just an input for composting or other processes, but I doubt the AC reply would like to test the safety of compost to consume... I sure know from the smell alone that you wouldn't want to ingest it. The composting process eliminates some pathogens, but the entire composted mix is literally alive with all sorts of microbes because that's how it works. You don't want any of that in your body.
My point is that agriculture uses a ton of things you wouldn't consume on their own. But the key is that it i
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> hocking the safety of your own urine-fertilized products, while asserting it's safe to consume the urine in the same breath
> yet it is not safe to consume
How does reiterating my point, get modded up?
> I don't see why being able to drink something used in agriculture is any sort of standard for safety.
He literally says it's safe to drink. The point was the transparency of his false propaganda, not a statement about safety standards...SMH
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I'm going ot tell you know because I'm not an idiot.
I think we can all be sure of that.
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If you hate him as much as you claim, why are you driving traffic to his videos? Are you attempting to solicit dislikes? Or is this a reverse-psychology viral marketing strategy trying to drive up views on monetised videos?
Relative risk (Score:5, Informative)
That's 41% relative increase. This means that if you take two people who have an equal chance of getting this cancer, and one is given a "high exposure," they are now 41% more likely to get this cancer than the other, unexposed person.
So if *everyone* got a "high exposure" the rate of this particular form of cancer would increase from 19.4 per 100,000 to 27.4 per 100,000.
That's still an eye-raising increase, but try to keep it in perspective. This does NOT mean 41% of people exposed get cancer.
=Smidge=
Comment removed (Score:5, Funny)
Re: Relative risk (Score:5, Informative)
I'm sure if I click through enough links I'll eventually be able to find out whether highly exposed means you had to bathe in the shit or something like that, but is high exposure in the context of these results a practical concern for anyone who isn't working directly with the product?
Re: Relative risk (Score:4, Interesting)
Is it ok if Monsanto is only poisoning farmers?
Re: Relative risk (Score:5, Insightful)
Is it ok if Monsanto is only poisoning farmers?
If the overall risk is lower than using alternative herbicides, then yes.
Glyphosate is a very effective herbicide that increases crop yields, is safer to handle than the broad spectrum herbicides it replaced, and enables no-till farming methods that reduce soil erosion and increase soil carbon retention.
We need to develop better equipment and techniques to handle it properly, and educate farmers on those techniques. But glyphosate is unlikely to be discontinued.
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Is it ok if Monsanto is only poisoning farmers?
If the overall risk is lower than using alternative herbicides, then yes.
How, I wonder, did human beings raise crops for thousands of years before herbicides, insecticides and artificial fertilizers were invented?
I only ask because I want to know.
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How, I wonder, did human beings raise crops for thousands of years before herbicides, insecticides and artificial fertilizers were invented?
Much less efficiently.
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How, I wonder, did human beings raise crops for thousands of years before herbicides, insecticides and artificial fertilizers were invented?
Much less efficiently.
False. The correct answer is much more labor-intensively. Modern farming techniques are designed to permit mechanization, in order to reduce labor. But planting crops in self-supporting guilds and returning human and animal waste to fields (after sufficient composting; even if you do nothing else to it, letting it lay around for a year will do the trick) increases crop yield per acre, and reduces the amount of energy spent per kcal of food energy produced. That is much more efficient if measured any way oth
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well if your honestly asking?
slash and burn was one primary method for pest and weed control, that is now highly regulated if not out right banned in the us.
as well as tilling and significant crop rotations that you find less of these days.
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Would you drink a cup of vinegar, ie dilute ethanoic acid?
Couldn't resist.
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Is it ok if Monsanto is only poisoning farmers?
That's not how it works, anyway. The farmers are using mechanical tilth which produces hardpan, which causes anaerobic conditions in the oil. Glyphosphate's ability to break down in the environment depends upon aerobic conditions. Consequently, it doesn't break down as advertised in the conditions in which it is actually used, and then it has a chance to enter our water systems.
Re: Relative risk (Score:2)
So, assuming a hazmat reclassification is needed, you don't think it's a big deal that Monsanto is trying to cover that up?
Re: Relative risk (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, lawncare companies often apply it on commercial and residential lawns (not to the grass itself, of course). If you just work at the company, probably no worries. If you are a kid that plays in the yard, you might get more exposure than the people who apply the stuff.
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Sure, and I was saying that we can't necessarily confine our concerns to just people that actually apply it, it's risks may extend to people who don't even know it has been applied.
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The instructions on my bottle specifically say not to let your kids and pets play in a treated yard for 72H.
Which, seems actually like a pretty short time. As I understand, one of the major advantages of glyphosate is how fast it's broken down in soil
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The instructions on my bottle specifically say not to let your kids and pets play in a treated yard for 72H.
So basically, the instructions are "round up your kids", not "Roundup your kids"?
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And then be sure to wring your hands about how kids today don't run around outside enough. Be sure to blame it on cell phones and video games.
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72H, twice a year. I don't think RoundUp is the thing causing kids not to run around outside man.
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What made you think it's twice a year? I've seen it applied weekly.
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And when it's washed off, it just magically disappears? Well that's a relief!
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They also wear gloves and masks, long pants and boots. They dilute it before application. They spray it using a spray wand. Compared to a kid rolling on the ground where it was applied (or even younger kids possibly tasting the dirt), the people applying it may actually ingest less of it.
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A few farmers here and there may do that, but they don't stay in business long. Try pricing a 50gal drum of herbicide, and then come tell us how you can afford to spray twice as much as your neighbor and stay in business.
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This is annoying as hell though.
I understand why scientists use high exposures when they want to know if something causes cancer. It's a simple way of determining things - just throw a ton of the stuff at a model organism, and see what results. If it causes cancer, then high concentrations should do the job.
But then the media runs with each and
Your stats are from where...? (Score:5, Informative)
I think you missed the point (Score:1)
It's not 'exposure to glycophosphate', it's 'high exposure.' Without access to the study, we have no clue what constitutes 'high.' So it's not a general 41% increase, it's a 41% increase for people with high exposure to glycophosphate.
Even in the article, the researchers admit that their meta-analysis (study of previous studies) focuses specifically on people with high exposure so the results are already hideously biased. You might as well do research about lung cancer, look only at people who smoke at leas
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You are looking at lifetime, and his numbers are annual. They are pretty much the same data presented in different ways. There is just enough difference that I think you are also using estimates from different annual reports.
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Not a study (Score:1)
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Who cares?
I mean literally, other than some oncologists, who cares?
When I need to buy food I go to the grocery store and buy whatever they have in stock that fits my budget. I don't care if it's been sprayed with glyphosate, DDT, or fairy dust. A pesticide is a pesticide is a pesticide.
How long are you planning to live? And for how many years of that would you like to experience acute, agonizing pain?
Interesting how we never hear about these things (Score:3, Interesting)
... until after the patents have expired.
Monsanto had 26 years of selling Roundup with no 'generic' glyphosate competition. In that time, not a word was published about carcinogenic properties.
But for the past 15 years or so, these stories have been dribbling out, and now they're becoming a flood. It's almost as if someone wanted to discredit the now-generic product in favor of a newer, still-patented alternative.
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... to discredit the now-generic product in favor of a newer, still-patented alternative.
There is no newer still-patented alternative.
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It's almost as if someone wanted to discredit the now-generic product in favor of a newer, still-patented alternative.
Monsanto is still the world's largest producer of glyphosphate. You think they'd be spending money to tell the world it's carcinogenic?
Difference in amount becomes difference in kind (Score:5, Insightful)
Key phrase: "people with high exposures to the popular pesticides"
On a related note, inhaled dihydrogen monoxide can be fatal and cause death within minutes without prompt medical assistance.
Re:Difference in amount becomes difference in kind (Score:5, Insightful)
Key phrase: "people with high exposures to the popular pesticides"
On a related note, inhaled dihydrogen monoxide can be fatal and cause death within minutes without prompt medical assistance.
Additionally, you have to be very careful when you select subsets. For instance, what if the people that get the highest exposure are just being generally unsafe with pesticides, smoking, etc and they also get a high exposure of a bunch of other stuff. By selecting a subset of a data, you may inadvertently be selecting for something else, such as risky behavior in general.
Personally I wouldn't stop using it, but I'd take reasonable precautions, like gloves, washing, and if in doubt immediately shower afterward. Then again, if your handling a chemical that makes something else not grow or die, common sense says be careful with it.
The other question I didn't see an answer to, is what do you have to do to get the highest exposure? If your throwing around a figure like 41%, you should say well people with this exposure typically got it by ...
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The other question I didn't see an answer to, is what do you have to do to get the highest exposure? If your throwing around a figure like 41%, you should say well people with this exposure typically got it by ...
Inhaling it in aerosol form on a regular basis. The first study that showed a correlation between glyphosate exposure and cancer looked at Spanish farm-workers who sprayed the stuff on their crops regularly and didn't wear a respirator.
So, if there is really a correlation, you have to be exposed to quite a bit of the stuff to make a statistical difference. Spraying it around your yard every once in a while probably won't make a difference.
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Psssh. Dihydrogen monoxide is for amateurs. I double dog dare you to drink a glass of Hydric Acid [wiktionary.org].
I do that as a party trick in the chemistry lab.
The secret is to first neutralise it with an equal volume of hydrogen hydroxide.
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Now what do they define as high exposure, and is it any worse than standing outside on a sunny carcinogenic day for 30 minutes?
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It's an herbicide. So maybe not without some effect. But it's primary effect is not as an insecticide.
Doesn't sound too great
Well, that's today's science literacy for you. Evil sounding chemical name is evil.
Overly processed foods. (Score:2)
Need At Least Three Answers To Care (Score:1)
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Amazing... (Score:1, Informative)
Amazing to see how many people here are gungho for glyphosate. I’m guessing the same bunch who think huffing coal smoke makes you stronger. Just a quick google search can explain how it works and just a little imagination and you can see why it might be a problem for human health.
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It's a POISON. We use it to KILL things that like the same kind of food we do. What's to struggle with?
Re:Amazing... (Score:5, Informative)
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indirect connection (Score:1)
It's an indirect connection by affecting some of the organisms that our body relies on.
At what exposure levels? (Score:2)
If you squirt it out on weeds on your lawn?
Get a little on your hands and wash it off?
Or like the guy who was basically BATHING in it with no protective equipment?
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/m... [cbsnews.com]
There's a HUGE range of possibilities in there.
Data required (Score:2)
I am not a statistician, so this question is asked in ignorance.
How does a meta-study, a study that assimilates existing data from existing *inconclusive* studies, produce a conclusive result? Am I missing something obvious?
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Because you may be able to discern a pattern that is not revealed in any single isolated study. To turn around an old folk saying, instead of seeing individual trees, you suddenly start seeing a forest. Each tree will still be its own entity, but you suddenly have a large pattern that each individual tree didn't provide a clue for.
There was something similar in clinical psychology and in psychiatry a few years back, regarding autism. A team performed a meta-study of various autism studies, and found a patte
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Meta analysis of other studies are _extremely_ dangerous. They can be much cheaper, and are much more easily distorted, than collecting real data with detectable, reproducible results. To cite your own example, are any of the newer studies actually measuring life expectancy for people with and without autism? Or are they also meta-analyses, receiving funding becuase the contemporary fascination with autism? And since the definition of autism has been malleable, and the rate of diagnosis of it has effectivel
Causation or correlation (Score:2)
tobacco industry playbook (Score:3, Insightful)
i see monsanto has been reading the old tobacco industries playbook and how they handled the cancer claims (until they no longer could).
Crop dessication (Score:2)
Due to the practice of crop dessication [wikipedia.org] it seems that the exposure (by which I mean ingestion) to glyphosate in the general population has risen a lot in recent years. Obviously this would differ between regions as the practice is more controlled in some regions than in others, differences in diet, and obviously the level of exposure probably is lower than what the article terms "high exposure". Still...
41% increased risk over WHAT? (Score:2)
Saying it has a 41% increased risk is a meaningless statement unless some context is provided regarding how likely it was to get it in the first place. If the odds are 1-in-a-trillion and we increase that by 41% that is just statistical noise, representative of nothing. Any headline that spouts a percentage risk increase without a context is nothing but clickbait.
So to put some facts to this, your lifetime risk of contracting Non-Hodgkin's lymphoma [cancer.org] is around 1/42 if you are a man and 1/54 if you are a wom
Poison is poisonous, doesnâ(TM)t require a st (Score:2)
Iâ(TM)m getting very tired of âoenewsâ and âoestudiesâ that say our common poisons that we use specifically to kill living things, are killing us. These shouldnâ(TM)t be surprising anyone.
Who thought that spraying poison in or around your house was a good idea?
If you want to kill things, thatâ(TM)s fine by me. But if you want to keep danger around you, itâ(TM)s a good bet that itâ(TM)s dangerous to you too.
Storing your gun in your childâ(TM)s bedroom, spray
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...booby traps in your own treasure room.
Ah, I see you too are a Dungeon Keeper player.
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Dude, did you look at the rest of the comments here? It's 99% "this doesn't matter."
Shill much, slashdot?.
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Dear Monsanto,
You are totally and completely fucked. There won't be enough money in existence for millions of years to cover the lawsuits you're going to lose.
You write that as if this were a desirable outcome. If what you describe happens, the corporation will go bankrupt and be dissolved. Most or all of its creditors will lose the money they are owed, and the perpetrators will go off happily with all the money they got through their vile dishonest deeds - and work for other companies.
The Chinese have a better way of dealing with criminals who cynically endanger, harm or kill other people to line their pockets.
They put them against a wall and shoot them.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
It seems that a spoonful of RoundUp wouldn't be so bad but a few of them (>85mL) could be fatal. The surfactant POEA makes it more toxic than just glyphosate.
So yeah, you could take the dare, that would be stupid but not enough to earn you a Darwin award.