California Workers Say Herbicide Is Giving Them Parkinson's (latimes.com) 43
An anonymous reader quotes a report from the Los Angeles Times: It was the late 1980s when Gary Mund felt his pinky tremble. At first it seemed like a random occurrence, but pretty quickly he realized something was seriously wrong. Within two years, Mund -- a crew worker with the Eastern Municipal Water District in Riverside County -- was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease. The illness would eventually consume much of his life, clouding his speech, zapping most of his motor skills and taking away his ability to work and drive. "It sucks," said Mund, 69. He speaks tersely, because every word is a hard-won battle. "I was told the herbicide wouldn't hurt you."
The herbicide is paraquat, an extremely powerful weed killer that Mund sprayed on vegetation as part of his job from about 1980 to 1985. Mund contends the product is responsible for his disease, but the manufacturer denies there is a causal link between the chemical and Parkinson's. Paraquat is manufactured by Syngenta, a Swiss-based company owned by the Chinese government. The chemical is banned in at least 58 countries -- including China and Switzerland -- due to its toxicity, yet it continues to be a popular herbicide in California and other parts of the United States. But research suggests the chemical may cross the blood-brain barrier in a manner that triggers Parkinson's disease, a progressive, neurodegenerative disorder that affects movement. Now, Mund is among thousands of workers suing Syngenta seeking damages and hoping to see the chemical banned.
Since 2017, more than 3,600 lawsuits have been filed in state and federal courts seeking damages from exposure to paraquat products, according to Syngenta's 2022 financial report (PDF). [...] Paraquat is 28 times more toxic than another controversial herbicide, Roundup, according to a report from the Pesticide Action Network. (Roundup has been banned in several parts of California, including a 2019 moratorium by the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors forbidding its use by county departments.) Paraquat also has other known health effects. It is listed as "highly toxic" on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's website, which says that "one small sip can be fatal and there is no antidote." The EPA is currently reviewing paraquat's approval status. However, both the EPA and Syngenta cited a 2020 U.S. government Agricultural Health Study that found there is no clear link between paraquat exposure and Parkinson's disease. A 2021 review of reviews similarly found that there is no causal relationship.
The herbicide is paraquat, an extremely powerful weed killer that Mund sprayed on vegetation as part of his job from about 1980 to 1985. Mund contends the product is responsible for his disease, but the manufacturer denies there is a causal link between the chemical and Parkinson's. Paraquat is manufactured by Syngenta, a Swiss-based company owned by the Chinese government. The chemical is banned in at least 58 countries -- including China and Switzerland -- due to its toxicity, yet it continues to be a popular herbicide in California and other parts of the United States. But research suggests the chemical may cross the blood-brain barrier in a manner that triggers Parkinson's disease, a progressive, neurodegenerative disorder that affects movement. Now, Mund is among thousands of workers suing Syngenta seeking damages and hoping to see the chemical banned.
Since 2017, more than 3,600 lawsuits have been filed in state and federal courts seeking damages from exposure to paraquat products, according to Syngenta's 2022 financial report (PDF). [...] Paraquat is 28 times more toxic than another controversial herbicide, Roundup, according to a report from the Pesticide Action Network. (Roundup has been banned in several parts of California, including a 2019 moratorium by the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors forbidding its use by county departments.) Paraquat also has other known health effects. It is listed as "highly toxic" on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's website, which says that "one small sip can be fatal and there is no antidote." The EPA is currently reviewing paraquat's approval status. However, both the EPA and Syngenta cited a 2020 U.S. government Agricultural Health Study that found there is no clear link between paraquat exposure and Parkinson's disease. A 2021 review of reviews similarly found that there is no causal relationship.
Re: (Score:3)
I don't understand why anyone would manufacture or use Paraquat or Atrazine when there are much safer alternatives such as glyphosate.
The EU has banned both Paraquat and Atrazine. Heck, even China has banned Paraquat.
Re: (Score:1)
I don't understand why anyone would manufacture or use Paraquat or Atrazine when there are much safer alternatives such as glyphosate.
Umm... Glyphosate (Round up) is known to cause cancer in the state of California. And according to the article at hand, Roundup has been banned in several parts of California.
Re: (Score:2)
I don't understand why anyone would manufacture or use Paraquat or Atrazine when there are much safer alternatives such as glyphosate.
Umm... Glyphosate (Round up) is known to cause cancer in the state of California. And according to the article at hand, Roundup has been banned in several parts of California.
So they use Paraquat instead? They should just ban all herbicides. Eventually we will find other places to grow our crops.
Re:Here's another lovely Syngenta herbicide... (Score:4, Interesting)
Glyphosate isn't "known" to cause cancer. The only evidence is based on p-hacking [wikipedia.org].
They should just ban all herbicides.
That's what Sri Lanka did. Then their economy collapsed when they couldn't feed themselves.
Eventually we will find other places to grow our crops.
Maybe on Mars. No weeds there.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I'm an Aspie. We read everything literally.
Re: (Score:2)
To be fair, the problem wasn't that they tried to quit, but that they they tried to do it cold turkey. And now people use that to try to prove that organic farming methods don't work.
Re:Here's another lovely Syngenta herbicide... (Score:5, Informative)
It is *not* known to cause cancer "in California", or anywhere (does it not cause cancer anywhere else? does California produce weak genes?)
Roundup is not Glyphosate, Roundup *contains* Glyphosate. Roundup also contains a crapton of other additives, and the additives are what are potentially cancerous, not the Glyphosate.
Glyphosate has been studied for about 5 decades and it's never been linked to cancer. Roundup, possibly, but still inconclusively. The IARC has labeled Glyphosate as a "probable" carcinogen, based on an association with cancer, based on some studies. No causation was found.
In particular, the finding related to human studies (where you don't actually experiment on humans, but just study people that live their normal lives), the only association with cancer was an increase in incidence of non-hodgkin lymphoma in people who work with or live near the spraying of glyphosate. Which means (at least) three things: 1) it could be something else on the farm causing increases in NHL, 2) it could be exposure to glyphosate as it's being sprayed that's the problem, and following safety guidelines could reduce this increase in NHL to normal levels, or 3) there could be some other completely different reason for the higher rates of NHL.
Assuming a Swedish study on glyphosate's contribution to NHL is correct, then in the very worst case, glyphosate raises your risk of getting NHL from 2%, to 2.8%.
Re: (Score:3)
The same study that linked glyphosate to NHL also found it was linked to a reduction of several other cancers.
But they tested for so many different afflictions that some of them were bound to match (either positively or negatively) just by chance. So it was just p-hacking.
Re:Here's another lovely Syngenta herbicide... (Score:5, Interesting)
Another thing we do know for a fact that Glyphosate does, is it disrupts the so-called Shikimate metabolic pathway [wikipedia.org] (which inhibits the production of enzymes needed to synthesize some amino acids). And thus the target organism, which is now unable to produce proteins, dies. That's exactly why it is the active ingredient in a herbicide: it kills plants.
The good news is mammals do not possess the Shikimate pathway (they have to ingest the amino acids that they need [wikipedia.org]). Plants, bacteria and fungi however do posses the pathway.
The bad news is that human (and other mammalian) gut is full of such bacteria and fungi, one could say we live in symbiosis with them since they are pretty important for us to help digest food and absorb nutrients (and even creating some nutrients inside our digestive tracts). Hence prebiotic and probiototic foods and supplements having become all the rage in recent years (health practitioners are often seen recommending fermented foods like yogurt, kombucha, sauerkraut, etc.).
As an example: I own a horse, and know a couple of other horse owners, and have a friend I've known since college days who produces a probiotic supplement for horses and other animals, based in part on soil microorganisms extracted from earthworm castings. It is quite striking to see the improvement in health, condition, coat shine, and temperament in horses who are given such a supplement.
So it would IMHO be conceivable (although certainly not a proof) that a human with sub-optimal nutrient uptake would also obtain less of the nutrients (vitamins and anti-oxidants) that would help his immune system to clear up precancerous cells, eventually leading to cancer in some individuals. (Of course, muddying the waters is that multiple factors in the modern world are detrimental to humans' gut biome, like antibiotics, sugar, alcohol, stress, processed foods, etc. Adding Glyphosate to that is not helping. And we presumably ingest more and more residues of the stuff, as things like Roundup Ready crops and the practice of crop desiccation becomes more established.)
The other bad news is that the soil also contains bacteria and fungi. (The guts of the earthworms already mentioned are veritable reactors, where these same microorganisms in high concentration digest plant matter. Incidentally pretty similar or identical to the microorganism population in our own guts, when healthy, ours are just less concentrated.) These microorganisms and other soil life are useful because they help to build soil structure, retain moisture, sequester carbon when they die, and - important - live in symbiosis with plants, which helps the plants with better nutrient uptake and thus better plant health - and ultimately causing better nutrient quality further up the food chain (which is important for humans if they are the ones getting nutrition from the plants).
As much as I love the progress and innovations stemming from western culture, we do seem to have this weakness that we often fail to see the forest for all the trees: our in-depth focus on details in isolation prevents us from seeing the holistic picture and the interactions and relationships between the parts - hence "unintended consequences" being so common.
I'm fortunate in the sense that I have some space, so I'm increasing my own production of chemical-free herbs and vegetables, relying less and less on the store for food needs. Horse manure, compost, and castings from my earthworm bin all are very valuable substances in the pursuit of this.
Re:Here's another lovely Syngenta herbicide... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
Glyphosate, a non-selective systemic biocide with broad-spectrum activity, is the most widely used herbicide in the world. It can persist in the environment for days or months, and its intensive and large-scale use can constitute a major environmental and health problem. In this systematic review, we investigate the current state of our knowledge related to the effects of this pesticide on the nervous system of various animal species and humans. The information provided indicates that exposure to glyphosate
Re: (Score:2)
I don't understand why anyone would manufacture or use Paraquat or Atrazine when there are much safer alternatives such as glyphosate.
Umm... Glyphosate (Round up) is known to cause cancer in the state of California. And according to the article at hand, Roundup has been banned in several parts of California.
To be completely fair, everything in California is known to cause cancer. Wood is known to cause cancer in California. Fucking wood. Trees and shit. How do I know this? Because we have to label every cabinet we make with a warning sticker for California saying wood is known to cause cancer. California is it's own special kind of weird. What's scary is, there are a number of people saying that California is America squared. All our weirdness amplified. We want to see where America as a whole is headed? Look
Re: (Score:2)
we have to label every cabinet we make with a warning sticker for California saying wood is known to cause cancer
That is a lie [ca.gov]. You only have to do that if you are using products on the wood which are on the P65 list. The wood itself has no such requirement unless it is treated. Manufactured wood products are another whole subject, but you were talking about wood and not those, whatever your intent might have been.
Re: (Score:2)
we have to label every cabinet we make with a warning sticker for California saying wood is known to cause cancer
That is a lie [ca.gov]. You only have to do that if you are using products on the wood which are on the P65 list. The wood itself has no such requirement unless it is treated. Manufactured wood products are another whole subject, but you were talking about wood and not those, whatever your intent might have been.
False. It's "wood dust" that causes us to have to label every piece of wood we ship to California. Sanding wood causes wood dust and wood dust is known to cause cancer in California. This is the exact reason handed to us by our law team. Wood dust. WTF?
Re: (Score:1)
Your law team is justifying their own existence... badly. That's a good reason to label your work facility, not your products. Lots of wood products carry no such label.
Re: (Score:2)
Or you're having so much fun pointing out others' perceived failures that you can't take two seconds to google it. [ca.gov]
Re: Here's another lovely Syngenta herbicide... (Score:2)
I googled it and the first hit was the government page that said it's not necessary that I posted already that you clearly didn't read or understand.
Tell me again how I didn't Google it.
Re: (Score:2)
I don't understand why anyone would manufacture or use Paraquat or Atrazine when there are much safer alternatives such as glyphosate.
Hey yeah, great idea. Let's hand yet more control of food markets to a German corporation!
Re: (Score:2)
Hey yeah, great idea. Let's hand yet more control of food markets to a German corporation!
The patent for glyphosate expired twenty years ago.
It is now manufactured by over a dozen companies.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Many of the traits of the seeds are still patented.
The "Roundup Ready" patent on glyphosate tolerance expired in 2014.
Chinese company must have good lobbyists (Score:3)
Otherwise how is it still legal in California?
Re: (Score:2)
Otherwise how is it still legal in California?
Paraquat is made by a company owned by the government of China.
It is sold in America but banned in China.
Perhaps China is getting even for the Opium War.
Re:Chinese company must have good lobbyists (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
Paraquat is legal in the US for the same reason a lot of things are. You have to prove something is unsafe to get it banned. The absence of evidence may not be evidence of absence, but that is not the way we treat it. The defense of lot of profitable products of questionable safety start with the phrase "There is no evidence "
Yet life is safer than it has ever been. You should have lived 100 years ago. Damned progress.
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah. They should be thanking their corporate masters for their Parkinsons. What an honor to live in such a healthy age!
Re: (Score:3)
Yeah. They should be thanking their corporate masters for their Parkinsons. What an honor to live in such a healthy age!
Guy in the article is 69. Even with Parkinsons he has exceeded the average life expectancy in the 1960s. Life wasn't actually better back then.
Re: (Score:2)
Exactly.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Life is safer now because of the efforts of people like this man who fight to have things that are killing us outlawed. It didn't just happen organically.
Re: (Score:2)
I for one am happy for the green revolution, including fertilizer, pesticides, and even GMOs. This ain't little house on the prairie any more.
Re: Chinese company must have good lobbyists (Score:2)
"You also won't feed 8 billion people organically (pun intended). Banning herbicides might well reduce cancer or Parkinsons. It will absolutely increase starvation. Pick your poison (no pun intended)."
Well, now we know you know absolutely nothing about the discussion we are having.
First, there are organic means of combating weeds.
Second, intensive organic farming produces more food per acre. It requires more labor, but there is plenty of labor available.
"I for one am happy for the green revolution, includin
Re: (Score:2)
Second, intensive organic farming produces more food per acre. It requires more labor, but there is plenty of labor available.
Unless your labor cost is approaching free it makes food vastly more expensive. This is certainly true in the developed world. Check the price of organic vs industrial grown fruit and vegies sometime (and I say this as someone who buys free range eggs and pastured meat. I can afford it but totally recognize most people can't).
You do know that many plants produce chemicals harmful to insects and also to other plants, right?
Indeed, plants can also produce or propagate many things that are harmful to humans as well, but nonetheless this is why I like GMOs. We can make more plants make those "natural" pe
Swiss had better lobbyists (Score:1)
Because the Swiss had better lobbyists than the Chinese, otherwise, why would something done by this Swiss company in 1980-1985 didn't surface until AFTER it was bought by the Chinese in 2017?
Syngenta [wikipedia.org] was founded in 2000 by the merger of the agrichemical businesses of Novartis and AstraZeneca, and acquired by China National Chemical Corporation (ChemChina) in 2017.
Or do you think the Chinese bought that company in 2017 and then time travelled back to 1980 to do bad things?
"2020 U.S. government Agricultural Health Study" (Score:1)
Re: (Score:1)
So is every other agricultural ministry in any other country. The capitalist oligarchy easily defanged anything democracy tried to put against it quite long time ago.
Marx's gravestone is shaking from all that laughter coming from 6ft under.
Late 70's (Score:3)
When I was in college in the latter half of the 1970's one of the local alternative rock radio stations was using "paraquat test kits" as the prizes in their radio contests. At the time they were saying that the US government was spraying paraquat on marijuana fields. Unethical growers would hurry up and harvest the fields, getting the tainted product to market before it shriveled up.
Someone felt that using this tainted product was a bad idea and came up with a test kit.
Re: (Score:2)
Well then (Score:2)
However, both the EPA and Syngenta cited a 2020 U.S. government Agricultural Health Study that found there is no clear link between paraquat exposure and Parkinson's disease. A 2021 review of reviews similarly found that there is no causal relationship.
Well, that's definitive then, right?
If a review of reviews is good enough to take harmless decongestants off the market, then it should be good enough to keep this herbicide on the market.
What's that? No?
MJF (Score:2)
Michael J Fox Foundation statement on Paraquat. I knew that MJF was involved with wineries in before being diagnosed. I wonder if there is any connection for him
https://www.biologicaldiversit... [biologicaldiversity.org]