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Whitewash: The Story of a Weed Killer, Cancer and the Corruption of Science

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Posted on by Carey Gillam

Released Oct. 2017: Carey Gillam’s new book about Monsanto, Roundup and glyphosate is available now through Island Press, Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or your local independent bookseller.

“Hard-hitting, eye-opening narrative…A forceful argument for an agricultural regulatory environment that puts public interest above corporate profits.”  Kirkus Reviews

“This is a must-read for everyone concerned about the increasing burden of toxic chemicals in water and food, the health and environmental consequences thereof, and corporate influence on government agencies.” Booklist 

“Journalist Gillam exposes a plethora of scientific research, legal materials, and documentary evidence recovered from corporate and government resources to paint a damning picture of the peddling of glyphosate by Monsanto and other agribusinesses … Gillam expertly covers a contentious front where corporate malfeasance intersects with issues of public health and ecology.” Publishers Weekly 

See also: USRTK News Release and Carey Gillam’s testimony before a joint committee of the European Parliament on 10/11/2017

Book Description

It’s the pesticide on our dinner plates, a chemical so pervasive it’s in the air we breathe, our water, our soil, and even found increasingly in our own bodies. Known as Monsanto’s Roundup by consumers, and as glyphosate by scientists, the world’s most popular weed killer is used everywhere from backyard gardens to golf courses to millions of acres of farmland. For decades it’s been touted as safe enough to drink, but a growing body of evidence indicates just the opposite, with research tying the chemical to cancers and a host of other health threats.

In Whitewash, veteran journalist Carey Gillam uncovers one of the most controversial stories in the history of food and agriculture, exposing new evidence of corporate influence. Gillam introduces readers to farm families devastated by cancers which they believe are caused by the chemical, and to scientists whose reputations have been smeared for publishing research that contradicted business interests. Readers learn about the arm-twisting of regulators who signed off on the chemical, echoing company assurances of safety even as they permitted higher residues of the pesticide in food and skipped compliance tests. And, in startling detail, Gillam reveals secret industry communications that pull back the curtain on corporate efforts to manipulate public perception.

Whitewash is more than an exposé about the hazards of one chemical or even the influence of one company. It’s a story of power, politics, and the deadly consequences of putting corporate interests ahead of public safety.

http://careygillam.com/book
Publication date October 2017

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More Praise for Whitewash

“The book unravels a tapestry of pesticide industry tricks to manipulate the scientific truths about their products while placing profits above human health and the environment. As someone who has experienced similar actions by corporations firsthand in my work far too often, I am hopeful that Carey’s book will be a wake-up call for more transparency about the dangers surrounding many chemicals in the marketplace.” Erin Brockovich, environmental activist and author

Carey Gillam has brilliantly assembled the facts and describes how Monsanto and other agricultural chemical companies lied about their products, covered up the damaging data and corrupted government officials in order to sell their toxic products around the world.  David Schubert, Ph.D., Professor and Head of the Cellular Neurobiology Laboratory at the Salk Institute For Biological Studies

Carey Gillam is a brave warrior in the mold of Rachel Carson. She has exposed the ruthless greed and fraud which have led to the poisoning of our planet. Brian G.M. Durie, M.D. Chairman of the International Myeloma Foundation, oncology specialist and attending physician at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center

In the grand tradition of Silent Spring, Carey Gillam’s Whitewash is a powerful exposé that sheds light on a chemical that — to most of us — is both entirely invisible and yet profoundly damaging to our bodies and our environment. It is a deeply researched, entirely convincing exposé of the politics, economics and global health consequences implicit in the spread of the world’s most common herbicide. Gillam has done what all great journalists strive to do: she has made us see clearly what has long been right before our eyes. Highly recommended.  McKay Jenkins, author, Professor of English, Journalism and Environmental Humanities at the University of Delaware

How Monsanto Manufactured ‘Outrage’ at IARC over Cancer Classification

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Posted on by Stacy Malkan
By Carey Gillam

Three years ago this month Monsanto executives realized they had a big problem on their hands.

It was September 2014 and the company’s top-selling chemical, the weed killer called glyphosate that is the foundation for Monsanto’s branded Roundup products, had been selected as one among a handful of pesticides to undergo scrutiny by the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC). Monsanto had spent decades fending off concerns about the safety of glyphosate and decrying scientific research indicating the chemical might cause cancer or other diseases. And even though the IARC review was still months away, Monsanto’s own scientists knew what the outcome would likely be—and they knew it wouldn’t be good.

Internal company records show not just the level of fear Monsanto had over the impending review, but notably that company officials fully expected IARC scientists would find at least some cancer connections to glyphosate. Company scientists discussed the “vulnerability” that surrounded their efforts to defend glyphosate amid multiple unfavorable research findings in studies of people and animals exposed to the weed killer. In addition to epidemiology studies, “we also have potential vulnerabilities in the other areas that IARC will consider, namely, exposure, genetox and mode of action…” a Monsanto scientist wrote in October 2014. That same email discussed a need to find allies and arrange funding for a “fight”—all months before the IARC meeting in March 2015.

And Monsanto predicted internally before IARC even met that the review of the scientific evidence would result in a decision that glyphosate “possibly” was carcinogenic or “probably” was. Monsanto officials had forecast the IARC decision in an internal “preparedness” plan that warned colleagues to “assume and prepare for the outcome…” The document shows Monsanto thought it most likely that IARC would peg glyphosate as a “possible human carcinogen.” The rating of probable carcinogen was “possible but less likely,” the Monsanto memo stated. IARC ultimately did classify glyphosate as “probably carcinogenic to humans.”

As the IARC meeting loomed, the internal documents show that Monsanto did not wait for the actual IARC decision before acting. It enlisted teams of PR and lobbying experts, scientists and others in a plan aimed at creating what was designed to appear as a storm of “outcry” and “outrage” to follow the IARC classification. IARC had a history of “questionable and politically charged rulings,” the Monsanto memo said.

The plan was to create enough controversy to thoroughly discredit IARC’s evaluation because Monsanto officials knew that regulators would be influenced by IARC, and continued widespread use of the top-selling chemical could be at risk.

“It is possible that IARC’s decision will impact future regulatory decision making,” Monsanto stated in its internal correspondence.

The timing was critical because in 2015 both the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the European Commission were evaluating re-authorizations of Monsanto’s weed killer. Following IARC’s classification, both the European Union and the EPA delayed final decisions on glyphosate amid the still-brewing debate over the chemical’s safety.

“What this indicates to me is that it was obvious to Monsanto that there was evidence of carcinogenicity,” said Peter Infante, an epidemiologist who worked for more than 24 years for the U.S. government studying cancer risks to workers from exposure to toxic substances. “It would seem to me that Monsanto does not like the public to be informed of the cancer hazard.”

“What this indicates to me is that it was obvious to Monsanto that there was evidence of carcinogenicity.”

After the IARC ruling, a storm of protest did erupt from various individuals and organizations alongside Monsanto’s howls of indignant outrage. Some have questioned the wisdom of U.S. funding for IARC and Monsanto has perpetuated a false narrative that the chairman of the IARC working group withheld critical information from the team.

The document trail, which includes internal emails, memos and other communications obtained from Monsanto by plaintiffs’ attorneys through litigation pending in the U.S., makes clear that the debate over, and challenge to, IARC’s classification did not sprout authentically from a variety of voices, but rather was manufactured by Monsanto in advance of IARC’s decision and continued afterward. The goals was—and is—to convince regulators to discount the findings of the team of independent scientific experts who made up the IARC team that examined glyphosate.

The internal records obtained through litigation, combined with documents obtained through Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) and state records requests also show that the actions employed to discredit IARC were part of a decades-long pattern of deceptive tactics by Monsanto to persuade regulators, lawmakers and members of the press and public that glyphosate and Roundup are safe. The company has used these tactics multiple times over the years to try to discredit several scientists whose research has found harmful effects associated with glyphosate.

“Orchestrate Outcry”

The IARC attack plan, which was laid out in a February 2015 memo, involved not only Monsanto’s internal PR people, scientists and marketing experts, but a range of outside industry players. Various individuals were assigned tasks. The “strategies and tactics” included:

  • “Orchestrate Outcry” with IARC Decision—Industry conducts robust media/social media outreach on process and outcome.
  • “Identify/request third-party experts to blog, op/ed, tweet and/or link, repost, retweet, etc.” The documents show one such “expert,” academic Henry Miller, was provided a draft article to submit to Forbes for publication under his name with no mention of Monsanto’s involvement. Forbes learned of the deceit last month and severed relations with Miller.
  • “Inform/Inoculate/Engage Industry Partners”—Notably the industry partners listed included three organizations that purport to be independent of Monsanto but have long been seen by critics as front groups for the company—Monsanto named Academics Review and the Genetic Literacy Project, both based in the U.S. and Sense About Science. which has run operations in the United Kingdom and the U.S., as groups to help with its mission. In fact, Sense About Science was the group identified by Monsanto to lead the industry response and “provide a platform for IARC observers.” The groups did as Monsanto planned, posting scathing attacks on IARC on their websites.
  • Engagement with Regulatory Agencies—Monsanto planned for grower associations/ growers to “write regulators with an appeal that they remain focused on the science, not the politically charged decision by IARC.”
  • “Push opinion leader letter to key daily newspaper on day of IARC ruling” with assistance of the Potomac Group marketing firm.

The preparedness plan also called for supporting “the development of three new papers on glyphosate focused on epidemiology and toxicology.” As planned, shortly after the IARC decision Monsanto arranged for several scientists—many of them former employees or paid consultants—to author and publish research papers supporting glyphosate safety. It was revealed through discovery documents that Monsanto discussed ghostwriting the papers. In one email, company scientist William Heydens told colleagues the company could “ghost-write” certain reports that would carry the names of outside scientists—”they would just edit & sign their names so to speak,” he wrote. He cited as an example a 2000 study that has been regarded as influential by regulators. Documents show Monsanto’s heavy writing and editing involvement in the resulting purportedly “independent” review.

Monsanto has adamantly denied ghostwriting, but one memo from August 2015 from the files of Monsanto scientist David Saltmiras actually uses that term, stating that he “ghostwrote cancer review paper Greim et al (2015)…” referring to a paper that showed authorship by German scientist Helmut Greim along with Saltmiras. (Monsanto has acknowledged that Greim worked as a consultant to the company with part of his job being to publish peer-reviewed data on glyphosate).

Another internal email illustrates the writing by a Monsanto scientist of a research paper titled “Developmental and Reproductive Outcomes… after Glyphosate Exposure.” The scientist, Donna Farmer, did extensive work, including what she called a “cut and paste” of certain information. But her name was not included as an author before the paper was submitted to a journal. The published version concluded there was “no solid evidence linking glyphosate exposure to adverse developmental or reproductive effects.”

The paper trail of documents also show that Monsanto feared that a U.S. health agency planning to review glyphosate in 2015 might agree with IARC and collaborated with the EPA to successfully block that agency—the Agency for Toxic Substances & Disease Registry (ATSDR)—from doing its review. “We’re trying to do everything we can to keep from having a domestic IARC occur,” a company official wrote. 

The record also shows that well before IARC, Monsanto recruited networks of academic scientists in the U.S and Europe who have defended Monsanto’s products, including its weed killer, without declaring their collaborations with Monsanto. And that these silent soldiers helped Monsanto discredit scientists who reported research showing harm associated with glyphosate and Roundup, including working at Monsanto’s bidding to get one damaging study by French scientist Gilles-Éric Séralini retracted from a scientific journal where it was published in September 2012. The company even discounted concerns by one of its own paid consultants who found evidence of glyphosate’s genotoxicity and refused to do the additional tests he recommended.

If what Monsanto says is true, that glyphosate is so very safe, and that there is no evidence it causes cancer or other health problems, then why all the smoke and mirrors? Why would the company need to ghostwrite research papers to present to regulators? Why would Monsanto need to establish networks of scientists to promote glyphosate safety and to tear down scientists whose research raises concerns? Why would Monsanto try to block a review of glyphosate by the U.S. ATSDR?

Two committees of the European Parliament have scheduled a hearing for Oct. 11 in Brussels to delve into these and other questions as the European Commission faces a looming deadline for making a decision on the re-authorization of glyphosate before the end of 2017.

Lawmakers should take note of evidence that their own food safety agency appears to have dropped the ball on independent assessments of glyphosate research. Records show that the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) dismissed a study linking Monsanto’s weed killer to cancer at the advice of an EPA official who Monsanto deemed “useful” and who is part of a probe now into possible collusion between the EPA and Monsanto.

They should also pay heed to news that EFSA based its recommendation on glyphosate on a report that copied and pasted analyses from a Monsanto study.

Monsanto Chairman Hugh Grant was invited to address the Parliament meeting in October, but declined to appear or to send anyone else from Monsanto. Dr. Roland Solecki, head of chemical safety for the German Federal Institute for Risk Assessment (BfR), has also declined, according to organizers. I do plan to participate, as will a representative from IARC and several others.

Throughout this debate, it is worthwhile to remember that the concerns about glyphosate safety have deep roots that date all the way back to at least 1985 when EPA toxicologists looked at data showing rare tumors in mice dosed with glyphosate and determined that glyphosate was “possibly carcinogenic to humans.”

Monsanto protests eventually reversed that classification but in light of all of the deceptive tactics recently revealed in documents, the words of an EPA scientist more than 30 years ago are worth considering today: “Glyphosate is suspect… Monsanto’s argument is unacceptable.”

The EPA scientist in that 1985 memo also wrote: “Our viewpoint is one of protecting the public health when we see suspicious data. It is not our job to protect registrants…”

European lawmakers would be wise to recall those words.

This article was originally published in EcoWatch.

Carey Gillam is a veteran reporter and author of Whitewash – The Story of a Weed Killer, Cancer and the Corruption of Science. She is research director for U.S. Right to Know, a nonprofit consumer watchdog group working for truth and transparency in our food system.  

Aspartame: Decades of Science Point to Serious Health Risks

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Posted on by Stacy Malkan

Long History of Concerns
Key Scientific Studies on Aspartame
Industry PR Efforts
Scientific References

Key Facts About Diet Soda Chemical 

What is Aspartame?

  • Aspartame is the world’s most widely used artificial sweetener. It is also marketed as NutraSweet, Equal, Sugar Twin and AminoSweet.
  • Aspartame is present in more than 6,000 products, including Diet Coke and Diet Pepsi, Kool Aid, Crystal Light, Tango and other artificially sweetened drinks; sugar-free Jell-O products; Trident, Dentyne and most other brands of sugar-free gum; sugar-free hard candies; low- or no-sugar sweet condiments such as ketchups and dressings; children’s medicines, vitamins and cough drops.
  • Aspartame is a synthetic chemical composed of the amino acids phenylalanine and aspartic acid, with a methyl ester. When consumed, the methyl ester breaks down into methanol, which may be converted into formaldehyde.

Decades of Studies Raise Concerns about Aspartame

Since aspartame was first approved in 1974, both FDA scientists and independent scientists have raised concerns about possible health effects and shortcomings in the science submitted to the FDA by the manufacturer, G.D. Searle. (Monsanto bought Searle in 1984).

In 1987, UPI published a series of investigative articles by Gregory Gordon reporting on these concerns, including early studies linking aspartame to health problems, the poor quality of industry-funded research that led to its approval, and the revolving-door relationships between FDA officials and the food industry. Gordon’s series is an invaluable resource for anyone seeking to understand the history of aspartame/NutraSweet:

Health Effects and Key Studies on Aspartame 

While many studies, some of them industry sponsored, have reported no problems with aspartame, dozens of independent studies conducted over decades have linked aspartame to a long list of health problems, including:

Cancer

In the most comprehensive cancer research to date on aspartame, three lifespan studies conducted by the Cesare Maltoni Cancer Research Center of the Ramazzini Institute, provide consistent evidence of carcinogenicity in rodents exposed to the substance.

  • Aspartame “is a multipotential carcinogenic agent, even at a daily dose of … much less than the current acceptable daily intake,” according to a 2006 lifespan rat study in Environmental Health Perspectives.1
  • A follow-up study in 2007 found significant dose-related increases in malignant tumors in some of the rats. “The results … confirm and reinforce the first experimental demonstration of [aspartame’s] multipotential carcinogenicity at a dose level close to the acceptable daily intake for humans … when life-span exposure begins during fetal life, its carcinogenic effects are increased,” the researchers wrote in Environmental Health Perspectives.2
  • The results of a 2010 lifespan study “confirm that [aspartame] is a carcinogenic agent in multiple sites in rodents, and that this effect is induced in two species, rats (males and females) and mice (males),” the researchers reported in American Journal of Industrial Medicine.3

Harvard researchers in 2012 reported a positive association between aspartame intake and increased risk of non-Hodgkin lymphoma and multiple myeloma in men, and for leukemia in men and women. The findings “preserve the possibility of a detrimental effect … on select cancers” but “do not permit the ruling out of chance as an explanation,” the researchers wrote in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.4

In a 2014 commentary in American Journal of Industrial Medicine, the Maltoni Center researchers wrote that the studies submitted by G. D. Searle for market approval “do not provide adequate scientific support for [aspartame’s] safety. In contrast, recent results of life-span carcinogenicity bioassays on rats and mice published in peer-reviewed journals, and a prospective epidemiological study, provide consistent evidence of [aspartame’s] carcinogenic potential. On the basis of the evidence of the potential carcinogenic effects … a re-evaluation of the current position of international regulatory agencies must be considered an urgent matter of public health.”5

Brain Tumors

In 1996, researchers reported in the Journal of Neuropathology & Experimental Neurology on epidemiological evidence connecting the introduction of aspartame to an increase in an aggressive type of malignant brain tumors. “Compared to other environmental factors putatively linked to brain tumors, the artificial sweetener aspartame is a promising candidate to explain the recent increase in incidence and degree of malignancy of brain tumors … We conclude that there is need for reassessing the carcinogenic potential of aspartame.”6

  • Neuroscientist Dr. John Olney, lead author of the study, told 60 minutes in 1996: “there has been a striking increase in the incidence of malignant brain tumors (in the three to five years following the approval of aspartame) … there is enough basis to suspect aspartame that it needs to be reassessed. FDA needs to reassess it, and this time around, FDA should do it right.”

Early studies on aspartame in the 1970s found evidence of brain tumors in laboratory animals, but those studies were not followed up.

Cardiovascular Disease 

A 2017 meta-analysis of research on artificial sweeteners, published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal, found no clear evidence of weight loss benefits for artificial sweeteners in randomized clinical trials, and reported that cohort studies associate artificial sweeteners with “increases in weight and waist circumference, and higher incidence of obesity, hypertension, metabolic syndrome, type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular events.”7

  • See also: “Artificial sweeteners don’t help with weight loss and may lead to gained pounds,” by Catherine Caruso, STAT (7.17.2017)

 A 2016 paper in Physiology & Behavior reported, “there is a striking congruence between results from animal research and a number of large-scale, long-term observational studies in humans, in finding significantly increased weight gain, adiposity, incidence of obesity, cardiometabolic risk, and even total mortality among individuals with chronic, daily exposure to low-calorie sweeteners – and these results are troubling.”8

Women who consumed more than two diet drinks per day “had a higher risk of [cardiovascular disease] events … [cardiovascular disease] mortality … and overall mortality,” according to a 2014 study from the Women’s Health Initiative published in the Journal of General Internal Medicine.9

Stroke, Dementia and Alzheimer’s Disease

People drinking diet soda daily were almost three times as likely to develop stroke and dementia as those who consumed it weekly or less. This included a higher risk of ischemic stroke, where blood vessels in the brain become obstructed, and Alzheimer’s disease dementia, the most common form of dementia, reported a 2017 study in Stroke.10

In the body, the methyl ester in aspartame metabolizes into methanol and then it may be converted to formaldehyde, which has been linked to Alzheimer’s disease. A two-part study published in 2014 in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease linked chronic methanol exposure to memory loss and Alzheimer’s Disease symptoms in mice and monkeys.

  • “[M]ethanol-fed mice presented with partial AD-like symptoms … These findings add to a growing body of evidence that links formaldehyde to [Alzheimer’s disease] pathology.” (Part 1)11
  • “[M]ethanol feeding caused long-lasting and persistent pathological changes that were related to [Alzheimer’s disease] … these findings support a growing body of evidence that links methanol and its metabolite formaldehyde to [Alzheimer’s disease] pathology.” (Part 2)12

Seizures

“Aspartame appears to exacerbate the amount of EEG spike wave in children with absence seizures. Further studies are needed to establish if this effect occurs at lower doses and in other seizure types,” according to a 1992 study in Neurology.13

Aspartame “has seizure-promoting activity in animal models that are widely used to identify compounds affecting … seizure incidence,” according to a 1987 study in Environmental Health Perspectives.14

Very high aspartame doses “might also affect the likelihood of seizures in symptomless but susceptible people,” according to a 1985 study in The Lancet. The study describes three previously healthy adults who had grand mal seizures during periods when they were consuming high doses of aspartame.15

Neurotoxicity, Brain Damage and Mood Disorders

Aspartame has been linked to behavioral and cognitive problems including learning problems, headache, seizure, migraines, irritable moods, anxiety, depression, and insomnia, wrote the researchers of a 2017 study in Nutritional Neuroscience. “Aspartame consumption needs to be approached with caution due to the possible effects on neurobehavioral health.”16

“Oral aspartame significantly altered behavior, anti-oxidant status and morphology of the hippocampus in mice; also, it may probably trigger hippocampal adult neurogenesis,” reported a 2016 study in Neurobiology of Learning and Memory.17 

“Previously, it has been reported that consumption of aspartame could cause neurological and behavioural disturbances in sensitive individuals. Headaches, insomnia and seizures are also some of the neurological effects that have been encountered,” according to a 2008 study in the European Journal of Clinical Nutrition. “[W]e propose that excessive aspartame ingestion might be involved in the pathogenesis of certain mental disorders … and also in compromised learning and emotional functioning.”18 

“(N)eurological symptoms, including learning and memory processes, may be related to the high or toxic concentrations of the sweetener [aspartame] metabolites,” states a 2006 study in Pharmacological Research.19

Aspartate “could impair memory retention and damage hypothalamic neurons in adult mice,” according to a 2000 mice study published in Toxicology Letters.20

“(I)ndividuals with mood disorders are particularly sensitive to this artificial sweetener and its use in this population should be discouraged,” according to a 1993 study in the Journal of Biological Psychiatry.21

High doses of aspartame “can generate major neurochemical changes in rats,” reported a 1984 study in American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.22

Experiments indicated brain damage in infant mice following oral intake of aspartate, and showing that “aspartate [is] toxic to the infant mouse at relatively low levels of oral intake,” reported a 1970 study in Nature.23

Headaches and Migraines

“Aspartame, a popular dietetic sweetener, may provoke headache in some susceptible individuals. Herein, we describe three cases of young women with migraine who reported their headaches could be provoked by chewing sugarless gum containing aspartame,” according to a 1997 paper in Headache Journal.24

A crossover trial comparing aspartame and a placebo published in 1994 in Neurology, “provides evidence that, among individuals with self-reported headaches after ingestion of aspartame, a subset of this group report more headaches when tested under controlled conditions. It appears that some people are particularly susceptible to headaches caused by aspartame and may want to limit their consumption.”25

A survey of 171 patients at the Montefiore Medical Center Headache Unit found that patients with migraine “reported aspartame as a precipitant three times more often than those having other types of headache … We conclude aspartame may be an important dietary trigger of headache in some people,” 1989 study in Headache Journal.26

A crossover trial comparing aspartame and a placebo on the frequency and intensity of migraines “indicated that the ingestion of aspartame by migraineurs caused a significant increase in headache frequency for some subjects,” reported a 1988 study in Headache Journal.27

Kidney Function Decline

Consumption of more than two servings a day of artificially sweetened soda “is associated with a 2-fold increased odds for kidney function decline in women,” according to a 2011 study in the Clinical Journal of American Society of Nephrology.28

Weight Gain, Increased Appetite and Obesity Related Problems

Several studies link aspartame to weight gain, increased appetite, diabetes, metabolic derangement and obesity-related diseases. See our fact sheet: Diet Soda Chemical Tied to Weight Gain.

This science linking aspartame to weight gain and obesity-related diseases raises questions about the legality of marketing aspartame-containing products as “diet” or weight loss aids. In 2015, USRTK petitioned the Federal Trade Commission and FDA to investigate the marketing and advertising practices of “diet” products that contain a chemical linked to weight gain. See related news coverage, response from FTC, and response from FDA.

Diabetes and Metabolic Derangement

Aspartame breaks down in part into phenylalanine, which interferes with the action of an enzyme intestinal alkaline phosphatase (IAP) previously shown to prevent metabolic syndrome (a group of symptoms associated with type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease) according to a 2017 study in Applied Physiology, Nutrition and Metabolism. In this study, mice receiving aspartame in their drinking water gained more weight and developed other symptoms of metabolic syndrome than animals fed similar diets lacking aspartame. The study concludes, “IAP’s protective effects in regard to the metabolic syndrome may be inhibited by phenylalanine, a metabolite of aspartame, perhaps explaining the lack of expected weight loss and metabolic improvements associated with diet drinks.”29

People who regularly consume artificial sweeteners are at increased risk of “excessive weight gain, metabolic syndrome, type 2 diabetes, and cardiovascular disease,” according to a 2013 Purdue review over 40 years published in Trends in Endocrinology & Metabolism.30

In a study that followed 66,118 women over 14 years, both sugar-sweetened beverages and artificially sweetened beverages were associated with risk of Type 2 diabetes. “Strong positive trends in T2D risk were also observed across quartiles of consumption for both types of beverage … No association was observed for 100% fruit juice consumption,” reported the 2013 study published in American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.31

Intestinal Dysbiosis, Metabolic Derangement and Obesity

Artificial sweeteners can induce glucose intolerance by altering the gut microbiota, according to a 2014 study in Nature. The researchers wrote, “our results link NAS [non-caloric artificial sweetener] consumption, dysbiosis and metabolic abnormalities, thereby calling for a reassessment of massive NAS usage … Our findings suggest that NAS may have directly contributed to enhancing the exact epidemic [obesity] that they themselves were intended to fight.”32

A 2016 study in Applied Physiology Nutrition and Metabolism reported, “Aspartame intake significantly influenced the association between body mass index (BMI) and glucose tolerance… consumption of aspartame is associated with greater obesity-related impairments in glucose tolerance.”33

According to a 2014 rat study in PLoS ONE, “aspartame elevated fasting glucose levels and an insulin tolerance test showed aspartame to impair insulin-stimulated glucose disposal … Fecal analysis of gut bacterial composition showed aspartame to increase total bacteria…”34

 Pregnancy Abnormalities: Pre Term Birth 

According to a 2010 cohort study of 59,334 Danish pregnant women published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, “There was an association between intake of artificially sweetened carbonated and noncarbonated soft drinks and an increased risk of preterm delivery.” The study concluded, “Daily intake of artificially sweetened soft drinks may increase the risk of preterm delivery.”35

  • See also: “Downing Diet Soda Tied to Premature Birth,” by Anne Harding, Reuters (7.23.2010)

Overweight Babies

Artificially sweetened beverage consumption during pregnancy is linked to higher body mass index for babies, according to a 2016 study in JAMA Pediatrics. “To our knowledge, we provide the first human evidence that maternal consumption of artificial sweeteners during pregnancy may influence infant BMI,” the researchers wrote.36

Early Menarche

The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute Growth and Health Study followed 1988 girls for 10 years to examine prospective associations between consumption of caffeinated and noncaffeinated sugar- and artificially sweetened soft drinks and early menarche. “Consumption of caffeinated and artificially sweetened soft drinks was positively associated with risk of early menarche in a US cohort of African American and Caucasian girls,” concluded the study published in 2015 in Journal of American Clinical Nutrition.37

Sperm Damage

“A significant decrease in sperm function of aspartame treated animals was observed when compared with the control and MTX control,” according to a 2017 study in the International Journal of Impotence Research. “… These findings demonstrate that aspartame metabolites could be a contributing factor for development of oxidative stress in the epididymal sperm.”38

Liver Damage and Glutathione Depletion

A mouse study published in 2017 in Redox Biology reported, “Chronic administration of aspartame … caused liver injury as well as marked decreased hepatic levels of reduced glutathione, oxidized glutathione, γ-glutamylcysteine, and most metabolites of the trans-sulphuration pathway…”39

A rat study published in 2017 in Nutrition Research found that, “Subchronic intake of soft drink or aspartame substantially induced hyperglycemia and hypertriacylglycerolemia… Several cytoarchitecture alterations were detected in the liver, including degeneration, infiltration, necrosis, and fibrosis, predominantly with aspartame. These data suggest that long-term intake of soft drink or aspartame-induced hepatic damage may be mediated by the induction of hyperglycemia, lipid accumulation, and oxidative stress with the involvement of adipocytokines.”40

Caution for Vulnerable Populations

A 2016 literature review on artificial sweeteners in the Indian Journal of Pharmacology reported, “there is inconclusive evidence to support most of their uses and some recent studies even hint that these earlier established benefits … might not be true.” Susceptible populations such as pregnant and lactating women, children, diabetics, migraine, and epilepsy patients “should use these products with utmost caution.”41

Industry PR Efforts and Front Groups 

From the start, G.D. Searle (later Monsanto and the NutraSweet Company) deployed aggressive PR tactics to market aspartame as a safe product. In October 1987, Gregory Gordon reported in UPI:

“The NutraSweet Co. also has paid up to $3 million a year for a 100-person public relations effort by the Chicago offices of Burson Marsteller, a former employee of the New York PR firm said. The employee said Burson Marsteller has hired numerous scientists and physicians, often at $1,000 a day, to defend the sweetener in media interviews and other public forums. Burson Marsteller declines to discuss such matters.”

Recent reporting based on internal industry documents reveals how beverage companies such as Coca-Cola also pay third party messengers, including doctors and scientists, to promote their products and shift the blame when science ties their products to serious health problems.

See reporting by Anahad O’Connor in the New York Times, Candice Choi in the Associated Press, and findings from the USRTK investigation about sugar industry propaganda and lobbying campaigns.

News articles about soda industry PR campaigns:

Overview news stories about aspartame:

USRTK Fact Sheets

Reports on Front Groups and PR Campaigns

Scientific References

[1] Soffritti M, Belpoggi F, Degli Esposti D, Lambertini L, Tibaldi E, Rigano A. “First experimental demonstration of the multipotential carcinogenic effects of aspartame administered in the feed to Sprague-Dawley rats.” Environ Health Perspect. 2006 Mar;114(3):379-85. PMID: 16507461. (article)

[2] Soffritti M, Belpoggi F, Tibaldi E, Esposti DD, Lauriola M. “Life-span exposure to low doses of aspartame beginning during prenatal life increases cancer effects in rats.” Environ Health Perspect. 2007 Sep;115(9):1293-7. PMID: 17805418. (article)

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[7] Azad, Meghan B., et al. Nonnutritive sweeteners and cardiometabolic health: a systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials and prospective cohort studies. CMAJ July 17, 2017 vol. 189 no. 28 doi: 10.1503/cmaj.161390 (abstract / article)

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[10] Matthew P. Pase, PhD; Jayandra J. Himali, PhD; Alexa S. Beiser, PhD; Hugo J. Aparicio, MD; Claudia L. Satizabal, PhD; Ramachandran S. Vasan, MD; Sudha Seshadri, MD; Paul F. Jacques, DSc. “Sugar and Artificially Sweetened Beverages and the Risks of Incident Stroke and Dementia. A Prospective Cohort Study.” Stroke. 2017 April; STROKEAHA.116.016027 (abstract / article)

[11] Yang M et al. “Alzheimer’s Disease and Methanol Toxicity (Part 1): Chronic Methanol Feeding Led to Memory Impairments and Tau Hyperphosphorylation in Mice.” J Alzheimers Dis. 2014 Apr 30. (abstract)

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[14] Maher TJ, Wurtman RJ. “Possible neurologic effects of aspartame, a widely used food additive.” Environ Health Perspect. 1987 Nov; 75:53-7. PMID: 3319565. (abstract / article)

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[16] Choudhary AK, Lee YY. “Neurophysiological symptoms and aspartame: What is the connection?” Nutr Neurosci. 2017 Feb 15:1-11. doi: 10.1080/1028415X.2017.1288340. (abstract)

[17] Onaolapo AY, Onaolapo OJ, Nwoha PU. “Aspartame and the hippocampus: Revealing a bi-directional, dose/time-dependent behavioural and morphological shift in mice.” Neurobiol Learn Mem. 2017 Mar;139:76-88. doi: 10.1016/j.nlm.2016.12.021. Epub 2016 Dec 31. (abstract)

[18] Humphries P, Pretorius E, Naudé H. “Direct and indirect cellular effects of aspartame on the brain.” Eur J Clin Nutr. 2008 Apr;62(4):451-62. (abstract / article)

[19] Tsakiris S, Giannoulia-Karantana A, Simintzi I, Schulpis KH. “The effect of aspartame metabolites on human erythrocyte membrane acetylcholinesterase activity.” Pharmacol Res. 2006 Jan;53(1):1-5. PMID: 16129618. (abstract)

[20] Park CH et al. “Glutamate and aspartate impair memory retention and damage hypothalamic neurons in adult mice.” Toxicol Lett. 2000 May 19;115(2):117-25. PMID: 10802387. (abstract)

[21] Walton RG, Hudak R, Green-Waite R. “Adverse reactions to aspartame: double-blind challenge in patients from a vulnerable population.” J. Biol Psychiatry. 1993 Jul 1-15;34(1-2):13-7. PMID: 8373935. (abstract / article)

[22] Yokogoshi H, Roberts CH, Caballero B, Wurtman RJ. “Effects of aspartame and glucose administration on brain and plasma levels of large neutral amino acids and brain 5-hydroxyindoles.” Am J Clin Nutr. 1984 Jul;40(1):1-7. PMID: 6204522. (abstract)

[23] Olney JW, Ho OL. “Brain Damage in Infant Mice Following Oral Intake of Glutamate, Aspartate or Cysteine.” Nature. 1970 Aug 8;227(5258):609-11. PMID: 5464249. (abstract)

[24] Blumenthal HJ, Vance DA. “Chewing gum headaches.” Headache. 1997 Nov-Dec; 37(10):665-6. PMID: 9439090. (abstract/article)

[25] Van den Eeden SK, Koepsell TD, Longstreth WT Jr, van Belle G, Daling JR, McKnight B. “Aspartame ingestion and headaches: a randomized crossover trial.” Neurology. 1994 Oct;44(10):1787-93. PMID: 7936222. (abstract)

[26] Lipton RB, Newman LC, Cohen JS, Solomon S. “Aspartame as a dietary trigger of headache.” Headache. 1989 Feb;29(2):90-2. PMID: 2708042. (abstract)

[27] Koehler SM, Glaros A. “The effect of aspartame on migraine headache.” Headache. 1988 Feb;28(1):10-4. PMID: 3277925. (abstract)

[28] Julie Lin and Gary C. Curhan. “Associations of Sugar and Artificially Sweetened Soda with Albuminuria and Kidney Function Decline in Women.” Clin J Am Soc Nephrol. 2011 Jan; 6(1): 160–166. (abstract / article)

[29] Gul SS, Hamilton AR, Munoz AR, Phupitakphol T, Liu W, Hyoju SK, Economopoulos KP, Morrison S, Hu D, Zhang W, Gharedaghi MH, Huo H, Hamarneh SR, Hodin RA. “Inhibition of the gut enzyme intestinal alkaline phosphatase may explain how aspartame promotes glucose intolerance and obesity in mice.” Appl Physiol Nutr Metab. 2017 Jan;42(1):77-83. doi: 10.1139/apnm-2016-0346. Epub 2016 Nov 18. (abstract / article)

[30] Susan E. Swithers, “Artificial sweeteners produce the counterintuitive effect of inducing metabolic derangements.” Trends Endocrinol Metab. 2013 Sep; 24(9): 431–441. (article)

[31] Guy Fagherazzi, A Vilier, D Saes Sartorelli, M Lajous, B Balkau, F Clavel-Chapelon. “Consumption of artificially and sugar-sweetened beverages and incident type 2 diabetes in the Etude Epidémiologique auprès des femmes de la Mutuelle Générale de l’Education Nationale–European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition cohort.” Am J Clin Nutr. 2013, Jan 30; doi: 10.3945/ ajcn.112.050997 ajcn.050997. (abstract/article)

[32] Suez J et al. “Artificial sweeteners induce glucose intolerance by altering the gut microbiota.” Nature. 2014 Oct 9;514(7521). PMID: 25231862. (abstract / article)

[33] Kuk JL, Brown RE. “Aspartame intake is associated with greater glucose intolerance in individuals with obesity.” Appl Physiol Nutr Metab. 2016 Jul;41(7):795-8. doi: 10.1139/apnm-2015-0675. Epub 2016 May 24. (abstract)

[34] Palmnäs MSA, Cowan TE, Bomhof MR, Su J, Reimer RA, Vogel HJ, et al. (2014) Low-Dose Aspartame Consumption Differentially Affects Gut Microbiota-Host Metabolic Interactions in the Diet-Induced Obese Rat. PLoS ONE 9(10): e109841. (article)

[35] Halldorsson TI, Strøm M, Petersen SB, Olsen SF. “Intake of artificially sweetened soft drinks and risk of preterm delivery: a prospective cohort study in 59,334 Danish pregnant women.” Am J Clin Nutr. 2010 Sep;92(3):626-33. PMID: 20592133. (abstract / article)

[36] Meghan B. Azad, PhD; Atul K. Sharma, MSc, MD; Russell J. de Souza, RD, ScD; et al. “Association Between Artificially Sweetened Beverage Consumption During Pregnancy and Infant Body Mass Index.” JAMA Pediatr. 2016;170(7):662-670. (abstract)

[37] Mueller NT, Jacobs DR Jr, MacLehose RF, Demerath EW, Kelly SP, Dreyfus JG, Pereira MA. “Consumption of caffeinated and artificially sweetened soft drinks is associated with risk of early menarche.” Am J Clin Nutr. 2015 Sep;102(3):648-54. doi: 10.3945/ajcn.114.100958. Epub 2015 Jul 15. (abstract)

[38] Ashok I, Poornima PS, Wankhar D, Ravindran R, Sheeladevi R. “Oxidative stress evoked damages on rat sperm and attenuated antioxidant status on consumption of aspartame.” Int J Impot Res. 2017 Apr 27. doi: 10.1038/ijir.2017.17. (abstract / article)

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Controversy, questions surround California’s listing of weed killer as cancer cause

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Posted on by Stacy Malkan

By Carey Gillam

This article originally appeared in Environmental Health News on July 7, 2017.

California’s official listing today of the world’s most widely used weed killer as a known carcinogen marks a milestone in what has been years of debate over the safety of the pesticide called glyphosate. But it by no means marks the end of controversy over the chemical, or arguments over what warnings – if any – should be placed on an herbicide that is a mainstay for U.S. farming and for maintaining household lawns and gardens, city parks and school grounds.

Officials with California’s Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA) have until early April to work out guidelines for glyphosate product warnings before requirements for such warnings take effect in July 2018. At the same time, OEHHA continues to face a court challenge from Monsanto Co., which introduced glyphosate more than 40 years ago, and makes billions of dollars off glyphosate-based Roundup herbicides. The chemical, now off patent, is also active in hundreds of other herbicide products.

“We will continue to aggressively challenge this improper decision.”-Monsanto 

“This is not the final step in the process… We will continue to aggressively challenge this improper decision,” Monsanto said in a statement.

California’s move to list glyphosate as a known carcinogen was triggered by the March 2015 decision by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) to classify glyphosate as a probable human carcinogen.

Under a state law known as Proposition 65, California is required to add a chemical to a list of known cancer-causing substances if it garners such a classification by IARC. The law then requires businesses to notify Californians about significant amounts of listed chemicals in products or released into the environment.

A particularly contentious part of the ongoing battle now surrounds what level of exposure California might allow without any warnings. The state has proposed what some see as an overly generous “safe harbor” or “No Significant Risk Level” (NSRL) for glyphosate at 1100 micrograms a day, meaning exposure levels and discharges into drinking water sources below that benchmark would be exempt from warning requirements.

That level is significantly higher than amounts that have been shown to have cancer-causing effects in several animal studies, however. Critics point to studies that have shown tumor developments in animals at doses of glyphosate lower than 850 mg/kg/day and even lower than 250 mg/kg/day.

“That NSRL would not be sufficiently health protective… We strongly urge OEHHA to uphold its statutory purpose to protect humans from the harmful impacts of glyphosate and lower the NSRL…” a group of scientists and environmental and food safety advocates told OEHHA in a letter.

Nathan Donley, Senior Scientist with the Center for Biological Diversity, said the research OEHHA relied on showed an “uncharacteristic” dose response to glyphosate, and if OEHHA would take other studies into account it would result in a dramatic lowering of the NSRL.

“The implications are enormous and it’s incredibly important that they get this right,” he said.

Adding intrigue to the debate, lawyers for scores of cancer victims currently suing Monsanto over Roundup have turned up documents showing that before California regulators set the NSRL they met privately with Monsanto. Documents obtained from OEHHA include notes from one October 7, 2015 meeting between OEHHA staff and Monsanto officials and indicate the parties discussed the company’s ideas about an calculating an NSRL and what studies should be looked at for development of that NSRL.

Among the attendees listed on an OEHHA memo were the agency’s Chief Deputy Director Allan Hirsch, Deputy Director for Scientific Affairs Melanie Marty, and Chief Counsel Carol Monahan-Cummings. The handwritten notes indicate that there was some discussion of what has long been a Monsanto talking point on glyphosate – that if glyphosate isn’t used, other, more-toxic herbicides might be used instead.

California attorney Pedram Esfandiary, whose firm is representing multiple cancer victims suing Monsanto, also believes California regulators have not incorporated adequate study data into their calculation of the NSRL. He said evidence developed through the litigation pending in federal court against Monsanto shows the company has withheld important information regarding glyphosate carcinogenicity.

Some documents obtained through the litigation have already prompted an investigation by the inspector general for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency into whether or not an EPA official engaged in collusion with Monsanto regarding the safety assessment of glyphosate. And there are many more relevant documents the lawyers are working to unseal now.

“Additional documents pertinent to the Safe Harbor NSRL and Roundup/glyphosate carcinogenicity are presently still under seal and it is strongly recommended that OEHHA obtain access to such documents before OEHHA takes the potentially precarious step of issuing an NSRL of 1100 micrograms,” Esfandiary and three other attorneys involved in the case said in a letter to OEHHA. “The known dangers of glyphosate warrant extensive investigation before Californians are exposed to any amount…”

OEHHA spokesman Sam Delson defended the agency’s proposed NSRL but said it is possible that OEHHA could change the NSRL for glyphosate as the agency reviews the input it has received from outside parties. NSRLs are developed to determine the level of exposure from an individual source that would cause a 1-in-100,000 lifetime cancer risk.

“We developed the proposed NSRL based on the best scientific information available to us. Neither Monsanto nor any other group or individual influenced the proposed NSRL beyond submitting comments or information for our consideration.” He noted that Monsanto opposes the proposed NSRL. Indeed, at a recent public hearing Monsanto representatives said the only acceptable NSRL for glyphosate would be “infinity.”

Several of the state’s Prop. 65 listings have drawn controversy and litigation but none have created the uproar that glyphosate has, according to Delson. “The decision to list glyphosate as a cancer cause has drawn by far the largest number of written comments ever received,” he said. More than 10,600 comments were submitted to OEHHA regarding the glyphosate listing and the NSRL issue.

The deadline for adoption of the NSRL is early April, Delson said. The goal is to have the NSRL finalized before the warning requirement takes effect in July 2018 so that companies will be able to determine whether they need to provide warnings and/or reformulate products in ways that allow them to avoid the need for warnings. Food products containing glyphosate residues that cause an exposure exceeding the final NSRL would be included in the warning requirement, Delson said.

As recently as June 20, Monsanto was continuing to press OEHHA to drop or delay the glyphosate listing, arguing that the IARC classification was invalid. OEHHA denied the request, clearing the way for the July 7 listing.

The company also continues to press the issue in the courts; it’s lawsuit against OEHHA was dismissed by a Fresno County Superior Court judge in March but Monsanto appealed the dismissal and that appeal is still pending. The company’s effort to block the listing while the appeal is pending failed.

Carey Gillam is the Research Director at U.S. Right to Know and a veteran journalist who specializes in coverage of food, agriculture and environmental issues.

Monsanto Spin Doctors Target Cancer Scientist In Flawed Reuters Story

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Posted on by Carey Gillam

In a well-orchestrated and highly coordinated media coup, Monsanto Co. and friends this week dropped a bombshell on opponents who are seeking to prove that the company’s beloved Roundup herbicide causes cancer.

A widely circulated story published June 14 in the global news outlet Reuters (for which I formerly worked) laid out what appeared to be a scandalous story of hidden information and a secretive scientist, “exclusive” revelations that the story said could have altered a critical 2015 classification that associated Monsanto’s Roundup to cancer and triggered waves of lawsuits against Monsanto.

It was a blockbuster of a story, and was repeated by news organizations around the globe, pushed by press releases from Monsanto-backed organizations and trumpeted by industry allies like the American Chemistry Council.

It was also flawed and misleading in a number of critical respects.

Authored by Reuters’ reporter Kate Kelland, who has a history of cozy relations with a group partly funded by agrichemical company interests, the piece accused a top epidemiologist from the U.S. National Cancer Institute of failing to share “important” scientific data with other scientists as they all worked together assessing the herbicide glyphosate for the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC). That group reviewed a wide body of research on glyphosate and determined in March of 2015 that the pesticide should be classified as a probable human carcinogen. Had the group known of this missing data, it’s conclusion could have been different, according to Reuters.

The story was particularly timely given glyphosate and Roundup are at the center of mass litigation in the United States and under scrutiny by U.S. and European regulators. After the IARC classification, Monsanto was sued by more than 1,000 people in the United States who claim they or their loved ones got non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) from exposure to Monsanto’s glyphosate-based Roundup and the company and the cases could start going to trial next year. Roundup is the most widely used herbicide in the world and brings in billions of dollars a year for Monsanto. The company insists the IARC classification is meritless and the chemical is proven safe by decades of research.

So yes, it was a big story that scored big points for Monsanto in the debate over glyphosate safety. But. drilling deeply into the sourcing and selective nature of the Reuters piece makes it clear the story is not only seriously flawed, but that it is part of an ongoing and carefully crafted effort by Monsanto and the pesticide industry to discredit IARC’s work.

The story contains at least two apparent factual errors that go to the credibility of its theme. First the story cites “court documents” as primary sources when in fact the documents referred to have not been filed in court and thus are not publicly available for reporters or members of the public to access. Kelland does not share links to the documents she references but makes it clear her information is largely based on a deposition from Aaron Blair, the National Cancer Institute epidemiologist who chaired the IARC working group on glyphosate, as well as related emails and other records. All were obtained by Monsanto as part of the discovery process for the Roundup litigation that is pending in federal court in San Francisco. By citing court documents, Kelland avoided addressing whether or not Monsanto or its allies spoon-fed the records to her. And because the article did not provide a link to the Blair deposition, readers are unable to see the full discussion of the unpublished study or the multiple comments by Blair of many other studies that do show evidence of links between glyphosate and cancer. I’m providing the deposition here, and disclosing that I requested and obtained it from attorneys involved in the Roundup litigation after Kelland’s story was published.

Second, the story relies in part on an anti-IARC view of a scientist named Bob Tarone and refers to him as an “independent” expert, someone “independent of Monsanto.” Kelland quotes Tarone as saying that IARC’s evaluation of glyphosate is “flawed and incomplete.” Except, according to information provided by IARC, Tarone is far from independent of Monsanto; Tarone in fact has acknowledged that he is a paid consultant to Monsanto, and a piece cited by Reuters and authored by Tarone last year in a European scientific journal is being recorrected to reflect Tarone’s conflict of interest, according to IARC, which said it has been in communication with that journal.

But much more noteworthy than the errors is how selective the story is in pulling from the Blair deposition. The story ignored Blair’s many affirmations of research showing glyphosate connections to cancer, and focused instead on Blair’s knowledge of one unpublished research study that was still in progress. The story hones in on speculation that the data perhaps could have been finished and published in time to be reviewed by IARC and further speculation by Blair, prodded by a Monsanto attorney, that had it been finished and had it been published it could have helped counter the other studies IARC viewed that showed positive cancer connections.

That research, part of a massive ongoing project by U.S. government researchers called the Agricultural Health Study, includes hundreds of studies and years of data analyzing pesticide impacts on farmers. Blair, who retired from the National Cancer Institute in 2007, was not leading that research but was part of a team of scientists who in 2013 were analyzing data about pesticide use and the risk of non-Hodgkin lymphoma. The data specific to glyphosate did not show a connection to NHL but in working to publish a paper about all the data the group had gathered, they decided to narrow the focus to insecticides and in 2014 did publish a paper on that work. The data on glyphosate and NHL has yet to be published, and some scientists who are familiar with the work say it has not tracked people long enough yet to be definitive given NHL generally takes 20 or more years to develop. A prior compilation of data by AHS researchers that also showed no connection between glyphosate and NHL was published in 2005 and was considered by IARC. But because the newer data was not published it was not considered by IARC.

Blair said the decision to limit the published work to insecticides was to make the data more manageable and was made well before IARC announced it would be looking at glyphosate in 2015.

“The rule is you only look at things that are published,” Blair told me this week after the Reuters story was published. “What would it be like if everyone on the working group whispered things they knew but weren’t published and made decisions on that?” IARC confirmed it does not consider unpublished research. In his deposition, Blair states that nothing has changed his opinion about glyphosate and NHL.

Epidemiologist and University of Toronto scientist John McLaughlin, who sat on the glyphosate working group for IARC with Blair, said to me in a note this week that the information about the unpublished work written about by Reuters did not alter his view of the validity of IARC conclusion on glyphosate either.

Also left out of the Reuters story – the deposition and a draft copy of the study in question shows that there were concerns about the AHS results due to “relatively small” subgroups of exposed cases. And notably, the Reuters report leaves out Blair’s discussion of the North American Pooled Project, in which he participated, which also contains data related to glyphosate and NHL but is not favorable to Monsanto. A synopsis of that project presented to the International Society for Environmental Epidemiology in 2015 showed that people who used glyphosate for more than five years had significantly increased odds of having NHL, and the risk was also significantly higher for people who handled glyphosate for more than two days per year. That information, like the new AHS data, was not given to IARC because it wasn’t yet published.

“When Dr. Blair’s deposition transcript is read in total, it shows that nothing was wrongfully withheld from IARC,” said Plaintiffs’ attorney Aimee Wagstaff. She said Monsanto was using pieces of the deposition to “further its agenda in the media.”

To epidemiologist Peter Infante, who spent more than 20 years leading a cancer identification unit at the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and analyzed a body of epidemiology research on glyphosate in testimony to an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Scientific Advisory Committee in December, the attention drawn to unpublished data that supports Monsanto’s position is much ado about nothing.

“You still have other studies that show dose response,” he told me. “This Agricultural Health Study is not the gold standard. For glyphosate and NHL they haven’t been following people long enough. Even if the data had been published and had been considered by IARC it would be in the context of all the other study results.”

And finally, in an odd exclusion, the story fails to disclose that Kelland herself has at least tangential ties to Monsanto and friends. Kelland has helped promote an organization called the Science Media Centre, a group whose aim is to connect certain scientists such as Tarone with journalists like Kelland, and which gets its largest block of funding from corporations that include the agrichemical industry. Current and past funders include Monsanto, Monsanto’s proposed merger partner Bayer AG, DuPont and agrichemical industry lobbyist CropLife International. Kelland appears in a promotional video for SMC touting the group and authored an essay applauding the SMC that appeared in a SMC promotional report.

As a Reuters reporter for 17 years (1998-2015) I know the value of an “exclusive.” The more such scoops a reporter garners, the more bonus points and high praise from editors. It’s a system seen in many news agencies and it works great when it encourages dogged, investigative journalism. But powerful corporations like Monsanto also know how eager reporters are to land exclusives and know that handing favored journalists cherry-picked information with the promise of exclusivity can serve their public relations needs quite well. Follow up the hand-fed story with a press release from an industry-funded outlet and calls for an investigation from the industry group American Chemistry Council and you have propaganda gold.

What you don’t have is the truth.

Canadians Report Weed Killer Detected in 30 Percent of Food Tested

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Posted on by Carey Gillam

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency has gone where the U.S. government dares not tread – testing thousands of foods commonly consumed by its citizens for residues of a controversial herbicide linked to cancer. And the findings are less than appetizing.

The agency said it found the pesticide known as glyphosate, the key ingredient in Monsanto Co.’s Roundup branded herbicides and other products, in 29.7 percent of 3,188 foods tested in 2015 and 2016. Glyphosate was found in 47.4 percent of beans, peas and lentil products; 36.6 percent of grain products; and 31 percent of baby cereals, the agency report states.

Only 1.3 percent of the total samples were found with glyphosate residue levels above what Canadian regulators allow, though 3.9 percent of grain products contained more of the weed killer than is permissible. These legally allowable levels are referred to as Maximum Residue Limits (MRLs), and they vary from food to food and pesticide to pesticide, as well as from country to country. Regulators and agrichemical industry interests say as long as residue levels are lower than the established MRLs, consuming the pesticide residues is not harmful to humans. But a growing number of scientists and medical professionals say such claims are false, particularly with pesticides like glyphosate, which is the most widely used agrichemical on the planet, commonly used in the production of dozens of food crops. Glyphosate is sprayed directly onto crops like corn, soybeans, sugar beets and canola, all of which are genetically engineered to tolerate the pesticide. Monsanto has also encouraged farmers to spray the chemical directly on oats, wheat, peas and lentils shortly before harvest to help dry them out.

“It’s all guesswork, and not based on a lot,” Dr. Bruce Blumberg, Professor of Developmental and Cell Biology in the University of California, Irvine’s School of Biological Sciences said of the MRLs. “Nobody is actually measuring levels of this pesticide in humans. They don’t do that but they should.”

The World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer classified glyphosate as a probable human carcinogen in 2015 and said years of research on the chemical shows strong evidence of genotoxicity and oxidative stress from glyphosate, including findings of DNA damage in the peripheral blood of exposed humans. Many regulatory bodies, including the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, have determined glyphosate is not carcinogenic, but the issue is the subject of much controversy. Internal Monsanto documents revealed through litigation in California indicate that the company many have ghost-written studies attesting to the safety of the chemical that were relied on by regulators. They also show the company discussing an EPA official that may help “kill” a cancer study of glyphosate.

Oddly, the USDA did intend to start testing some food samples for glyphosate this year, with a start date of April 1, agency documents obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests show. But the agency decided to abandon that plan earlier this year. As well, the FDA started its first-even glyphosate testing program last year but suspended that “special assignment” in September. Even the CFIA has handled the glyphosate testing in a curious manner: The agency said it would not release detailed data on glyphosate residues found in food because it is considered “confidential business information.”

A source within the FDA said there has been political pressure not to delve too deeply into the issue of glyphosate residues. But both the USDA and FDA have said their reasons for not testing have nothing to do with outside influence and are purely based on the fact that glyphosate is more difficult and expensive to test for than other pesticides, and the fact that it is considered safe. The FDA has said it is working on resuming its limited testing of corn, soy, eggs and milk for glyphosate residues.

“I’m not sure what is going on, but it doesn’t smell good,” said Blumberg, who has been active in lobbying Irvine school districts and city leaders to reduce their use of glyphosate and other pesticides in public areas.

Glyphosate: Health Concerns About the Most Widely Used Pesticide

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Posted on by Stacy Malkan

Updates: Carey Gillam’s book about glyphosate is now available from Island Press. See also Gillam’s presentation about glyphosate to European Parliament committees and the Monsanto Papers archive of documents. 

Glyphosate is a synthetic herbicide patented in 1974 by the Monsanto Company, and now manufactured and sold by many companies in hundreds of products around the world. Glyphosate is best known as the active ingredient in Monsanto’s Roundup branded herbicides.

Here are some key facts about glyphosate:

Most Widely Used Pesticide 

According to a February 2016 study in Environmental Sciences Europe, glyphosate is the most widely used pesticide. “In the U.S., no pesticide has come remotely close to such intensive and widespread use,” according to the study. Findings include:

  • Americans have applied 1.8 million tons of glyphosate since its introduction in 1974.
  • Worldwide 9.4 million tons of the chemical has been sprayed on fields – enough to spray nearly half a pound of Roundup on every cultivated acre of land in the world.
  • Globally, glyphosate use has risen almost 15-fold since so-called “Roundup Ready,” genetically engineered glyphosate-tolerant crops were introduced in 1996.

Cancer Concerns

In 2015, the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) classified glyphosate as “probably carcinogenic to humans.” The team of international scientists found there was a particularly strong link between glyphosate and non-Hodgkin lymphoma.

On March 28, 2017, the California Environmental Protection Agency’s Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment confirmed that it would add glyphosate to California’s Proposition 65 list of chemicals known to cause cancer. Monsanto sued to block the action but the case was dismissed.

The EPA convened a Scientific Advisory Panel (SAP) in December 2016 to receive expert feedback from independent scientists about the assessment and the conclusion contained in the issue paper. The panel members were divided in their assessment of EPA’s work, with some finding the EPA erred in how it evaluated certain research and reached its conclusion. The EPA’s final report on glyphosate is scheduled to be released before the end of 2017.

According to an internal EPA document, two EPA departments disagreed with each other about glyphosate safety. The Office of Research and Development’s epidemiologists said the Office of Pesticide Programs had not followed proper agency protocol in determining glyphosate was “not likely to be carcinogenic to humans.”

The European Food Safety Authority and the European Chemicals Agency have said glyphosate is not likely to be carcinogenic to humans. A March 2017 report by environmental and consumer groups argues that regulators relied improperly on research that was directed and manipulated by the chemical industry.

The World Health Organization Joint Meeting on Pesticide Residues also cleared glyphosate as unlikely to pose a risk to humans, although that group was tarnished by conflicts of interest regarding ties to the International Life Sciences Institute, a food industry front group.

Cancer Lawsuits

More than 50 lawsuits against Monsanto Co. are pending in U.S. District Court in San Francisco, filed by people alleging that exposure to Roundup herbicide caused them or their loved ones to develop non-Hodgkin lymphoma, and that Monsanto covered up the risks. The litigation has been consolidated as multidistrict litigation (MDL) for more efficient processing. Several hundred similar actions are pending in state courts.

In March 2017, the federal court judge overseeing the MDL unsealed some internal Monsanto documents that raised new questions about Monsanto’s influence on the EPA process and about the research regulators rely on. The documents suggest that Monsanto’s long-standing claims about the safety of glyphosate and Roundup do not necessarily rely on sound science as the company asserts, but on efforts to manipulate the science.

U.S. Right to Know is posting key documents and analysis from the litigation.

Endocrine Disruption and Other Health Concerns

Some research has also indicated that glyphosate may be an endocrine disruptor; has been linked to liver disease, birth defects and reproductive problems in laboratory animals; and may kill beneficial gut bacteria and damage the DNA in human embryonic, placental and umbilical cord cells.

Many scientists have raised concerns about the health risks of glyphosate:

GMO Connection

Most genetically modified (GMO) crops – some 94% of soy and 89% of corn grown in the U.S., according to USDA data – are “herbicide tolerant” crops that have been genetically engineered to withstand glyphosate exposure.

Globally, glyphosate use has risen almost 15-fold since so-called “Roundup Ready” GMO crops were introduced in 1996, according to a study by Charles Benbrook in Environmental Sciences Europe.

Desiccation 

Farmers also use glyphosate on non-GMO crops such as wheat, barley, oats, and lentils to dry down the crop ahead of harvest in order to accelerate the harvest. This practice, known as desiccation, may be a significant source of dietary exposure to glyphosate, according to Benbrook.

Glyphosate Found in Food: U.S. Drags Its Feet on Testing

The USDA has quietly dropped a plan to start testing food for residues of glyphosate. Internal agency documents obtained by U.S. Right to Know show the agency had planned to start testing over 300 samples of corn syrup for glyphosate on April 1, 2017. Now the agency says the plan is dead. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration began a limited testing program of its own in 2016, but the effort was fraught with controversy and internal difficulties and the program was suspended in September 2016. Both agencies have programs that annually test foods for pesticide residues but both have routinely skipped testing for glyphosate.

Before the suspension, one FDA chemist found alarming levels of glyphosate in many samples of U.S. honey, levels that were technically illegal because there have been no allowable levels established for honey by the EPA. Here are the most recent findings about glyphosate levels in food:

  • Sept. 21, 2016: FDA found glyphosate in US honey at double the levels allowed in the EU.
  • Nov. 3, 2016: FDA chemist found glyphosate in honey in Iowa at 10X higher levels than allowed in EU.

Pesticides in Our Food: Where’s the Safety Data?

USDA data from 2016 shows detectable pesticide levels in 85% of more than 10,000 foods sampled, everything from mushrooms to grapes to green beans. The government says there are little to no health risks, but some scientists say there is little to no data to back up that claim. See: New Data on Pesticides in Food Raises Safety Questions

Monsanto Weed Killer: Scientific Manipulation Revealed

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Posted on by Stacy Malkan

Also see: MDL Monsanto Glyphosate Cancer Case Key Documents and Analysis
and US Right to Know Sues EPA for Release of Glyphosate Documents

By Carey Gillam 

The puzzle pieces are starting to fall into place, but so far it’s not a pretty picture.

A series of internal Monsanto Co. documents revealed this week via a court order show that the company’s long-standing claims about the safety of its top-selling Roundup herbicide do not necessarily rely on sound science as the company asserts, but on efforts to manipulate the science.

Congressman Ted Lieu of California has called for an investigation by Congress and the Department of Justice to look into the matter, and he is advising consumers to “immediately” stop using Roundup.

“We need to find out if Monsanto or the Environmental Protection Agency misled the public,” Lieu said in a statement.”

Hundreds of pages of emails and other records became part of a public court file this week over Monsanto objections after a federal judge in San Francisco ordered they would no longer be kept sealed despite potential “embarrassment” to Monsanto. U.S. District Judge Vince Chhabria is overseeing more than 55 lawsuits brought by individuals filed by people from around the United States who allege that exposure to Monsanto’s Roundup herbicide caused them or their loved ones to develop non-Hodgkin lymphoma. In addition to those cases, which are moving forward jointly in what is known as “multdistrict litigation (MDL), hundreds of other cases making similar claims are pending in state courts.

Questions about the key ingredient in Roundup, a chemical called glyphosate, have been circulating for years amid mounting research showing links to cancer or other diseases. The International Agency for Research on Cancer in 2015 classified glyphosate as a probable human carcinogen and many international scientists have reported research that shows the chemical can have a range of harmful impacts on people.

The plaintiffs in the lawsuit allege that the combination of glyphosate with certain surfactants used in Monsanto-branded Roundup products is even more toxic than glyphosate alone, and Monsanto has sought to cover up that information.

Monsanto has denied that there are cancer connections to glyphosate or Roundup and says 40 years of research and scrutiny by regulatory agencies around the world confirm its safety. On Wednesday a European Chemicals Agency’s committee said its review found glyphosate is not a carcinogen.

Documents seem to show a company less interested in exploring mounting concerns about its products than in protecting the billions of dollars in revenue it makes each year from the herbicides.

But a look at the documents obtained by plaintiffs from Monsanto as part of court-ordered discovery seem to show a company less interested in exploring mounting concerns about its products than in protecting the billions of dollars in revenue it makes each year from the herbicides. The documents show discussions by Monsanto officials about many troubling practices, including ghostwriting a glyphosate manuscript that would appear to be authored by a highly regarded, independent scientist who Monsanto and other chemical industry players would pay for participation. One such scientist would need “less than 10 days” to do the work needed but would require payment of more than $21,000, the records show.

In a 2015 email, Monsanto executive William Heydens suggested that Monsanto employees could ghostwrite a research paper as he said had been done in the past: “We would be keeping the cost down by us doing the writing and they would just edit & sign their names so to speak,” Heydens wrote.

The internal communications also show company executives expressing dissatisfaction with a scientist who had concerns about glyphosate, and an unwillingness to do the studies he suggested needed to be done. Monsanto officials discussed a need to “find/develop someone who is comfortable with the genetox profile of glyphosate/Roundup and who can be influential with regulators… when genetox issues arise.”

Other records show an internal discussion of how glyphosate and surfactants it is formulated with work together in penetrating human skin upon exposure; documents that discuss a need to “protect” formulations that use tallow amine as a surfactant despite formulations, despite concerns about enhanced toxicity when glyphosate and tallow amine are combined.

And perhaps most damning – the internal records indicate that a senior EPA official in the agency’s pesticide division worked collaboratively with Monsanto to protect glyphosate’s safety record. Jess Rowland, who headed an EPA Cancer Assessment Review Committee (CARC) report that backed the safety of glyphosate, told Monsanto he would try to block a planned U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ review of glyphosate’s safety, saying: “If I can kill this I should get a medal,” according to a 2015 internal Monsanto email.

Rowland “could be useful as we move forward with ongoing glyphosate defense,” Dan Jenkins, Monsanto’s chief regulatory liaison, wrote in a 2015 email. Rowland left the agency shortly after the CARC report was leaked to the public, posted to an agency website in late April 2016 before it was deleted a few days later. Plaintiffs’ attorneys hope to depose Rowland within the next few weeks, though the EPA has opposed the deposition.

The documents released this week provide only a snapshot of the internal workings of Monsanto when it comes to glyphosate, and the company has argued that the emails and other communications are being taken out of context by plaintiffs’ attorneys and media. The company’s work is built on “sound science,” and “governed by the highest principles of integrity and transparency,” Monsanto states.

The EPA has also consistently defended the safety of glyphosate, issuing a report in September that concluded that glyphosate was “not likely carcinogenic to humans.”

But in a report released Thursday, a special advisory panel to the EPA said they could not fully agree with that determination. Some of the panel members who reviewed the research said studies on glyphosate “suggest a potential for glyphosate to affect cancer incidence.” The group said the EPA was improperly discounting the findings of some studies, and “many of the arguments put forth” by the EPA as supporting glyphosate safety “are not persuasive.”

Real answers about the real impacts of Roundup on human health are long overdue, considering the fact that glyphosate is the most widely used herbicide in the world, and is commonly found in food and water and human urine samples.

“The importance of this issue of whether Roundup causes cancer is immense,” the plaintiffs’ attorneys stated in a recent court filing. “Unfortunately, Monsanto is not forthcoming with sharing information on Roundup with the public.”

This story originally appeared in Huffington Post. Sign up to receives breaking news and updates from US Right to Know: https://usrtk.org/sign-up/

Questions about EPA-Monsanto collusion raised in cancer lawsuits

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Posted on by Carey Gillam

Now  it’s getting interesting.

A new court filing made on behalf of dozens of people claiming Monsanto Co.’s Roundup herbicide gave them cancer includes information about alleged efforts within the Environmental Protection Agency to protect Monsanto’s interests and unfairly aid the agrichemical industry.

The filing, made late Friday by plaintiff’s attorneys, includes what the attorneys represent to be correspondence from a 30-year career EPA scientist accusing top-ranking EPA official Jess Rowland of playing “your political conniving games with the science” to favor pesticide manufacturers such as Monsanto. Rowland oversaw the EPA’s cancer assessment for glyphosate, the key ingredient in Monsanto’s weed-killing products, and was a key author of a report finding glyphosate was not likely to be carcinogenic. But in the correspondence, longtime EPA toxicologist Marion Copley cites evidence from animal studies and writes: “It is essentially certain that glyphosate causes cancer.”

Attorneys for the plaintiffs declined to say how they obtained the correspondence, which is dated March 4, 2013. The date of the letter comes after Copley left the EPA in 2012 and shortly before she died from breast cancer at the age of 66 in January 2014. She accuses Rowland of having “intimidated staff” to change reports to favor industry, and writes that research on glyphosate, the key ingredient in Monsanto’s Roundup, shows the pesticide should be categorized as a “probable human carcinogen.” The International Agency for Research on Cancer, an arm of the World Health Organization, declared as much – that glyphosate was a probable human carcinogen – in March 2015 after reviewing multiple scientific studies. Monsanto has rejected that classification and has mounted a campaign to discredit IARC scientists.

The communication, if authentic, could be an explosive development in the snowballing multi-district litigation that now comprises more than 60 plaintiffs from around the United States accusing Monsanto of covering up evidence that Roundup herbicide could cause cancer. The plaintiffs, all of whom are suffering from non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) or lost a loved one to NHL, have asserted in recent court filings that Monsanto wielded significant influence within the EPA’s Office of Pesticide Programs (OPP), and had close ties specifically to Rowland, who until last year was deputy division director within the health effects division of the OPP. Rowland managed the work of scientists who assessed human health effects of exposures to pesticides like glyphosate and he chaired the EPA’s Cancer Assessment Review Committee (CARC) that determined glyphosate was “not likely to be carcinogenic to humans.” Rowland left the EPA in 2016 shortly after a copy of the CARC report was leaked and cited by Monsanto as evidence that the IARC classification was flawed.

Lawyers for the plaintiffs want the federal judge in the case to lift a seal on documents that detail Monsanto’s interactions with Rowland regarding the EPA’s safety assessment of glyphosate. Monsanto turned the documents over in discovery but marked them “confidential,” a designation plaintiffs’ attorneys say is improper. They also want to depose Rowland. But Monsanto and the EPA object to the requests, court documents show. Rowland could not be reached for comment, and the EPA declined to comment about the court matters.

“The Plaintiffs have a pressing need for Mr. Rowland’s testimony to confirm his relationship with Monsanto and EPA’s substantial role in protecting the Defendant’s business…” plaintiff’s attorneys wrote in the Feb. 10 filing in the multi-district litigation, which has been consolidated in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California. “Mr. Rowland operated under Monsanto’s influence to cause EPA’s position and publications to support Monsanto’s business.”

The EPA has spent the last few years assessing the health and environmental safety profile of glyphosate as global controversy over the chemical has mounted. The agency had planned to finish its risk assessment on glyphosate in 2015; then said it would be completed in 2016; then said it would be finished by the first quarter of 2017. Now the agency says it hopes to have it completed by the end of the third quarter of 2017.

MONSANTO WANTS DOCUMENTS KEPT SECRET

In a bid to stop the release of further damning documents, attorneys for Monsanto on Monday asked the federal judge in the Roundup litigation to block plaintiffs’ attorneys from including copies of documents they’ve obtained through discovery as exhibits in the court filings because members of the public and the media can see them. They argued that plaintiffs’ attorneys were unfairly attempting to “try this case in the court of public opinion.” Monsanto specifically complained that the organization I work for, U.S. Right to Know, was monitoring the court docket looking for confidential materials to report to the public. The company said reporting on “cherry-picked documents” could be “potentially prejudicial” to its business and to the fairness of the litigation, potentially tainting a jury pool. “Litigation in the press is not in the public interest,” Monsanto’s filing states.

The company asked Judge Vince Chhabria to order that discovery materials not be filed as exhibits or other types of filings that could be visible to the public.

Monsanto also made a new filing in the litigation on Friday, laying out its assertion that there is no evidence Roundup and glyphosate products are “defective or unreasonably dangerous” and said the products complied with “all applicable government safety standards.” There is no evidence of carcinogenicity in glyphosate or Roundup, Monsanto said in its filing.

In a separate filing made on Feb. 8, Monsanto submitted a court brief arguing that the IARC classification of glyphosate as a probable human carcinogen is not relevant to the question of whether or not Roundup caused the plaintiffs’ cancers. IARC’s approach is “less rigorous” than EPA’s in evaluating scientific evidence, and IARC’s conclusions are “scientifically unreliable,” according to the brief. Monsanto told the court that neither the views of IARC or EPA are necessarily relevant to the general causation issue of the litigation because plaintiffs will need to present admissible expert testimony showing the company’s products in fact caused their cancers.

As the litigation drags on, legislation that could potentially benefit Monsanto and numerous other companies facing consumer class action lawsuits was proposed on Feb. 9. The “Fairness in Class Action Litigation Act of 2017” (H.R. 985) was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives by House Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-VA.) Business interests backing the law say it would reduce frivolous suits and ensure that plaintiffs receive the bulk of any damage awards rather than enriching the attorneys who bring such lawsuits. But opponents say it would make it nearly impossible for individuals with limited financial resources to challenge powerful corporations in court. The bill would apply both to pending and future class action and multi-district litigation.

“The bill is designed to ensure that no class action could ever be brought or litigated for anyone,” said Joanne Doroshow, executive director of the Center for Justice & Democracy. “It would obliterate civil rights, antitrust, consumer, essentially every class action in America.”

IARC Scientists Defend Glyphosate Cancer Link; Surprised by Industry Assault

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Posted on by Carey Gillam

Don’t mess with Monsanto Co. That is the message being delivered right now by the agrichemical industry as it makes a full-fledged assault on the team of international

cancer scientists who dared to declare cancerous connections to the widely used herbicide called glyphosate, the chief ingredient in Monsanto’s Roundup brand.

Industry swagger is on full display in Washington where Monsanto and its friends at CropLife America are driving efforts to cut off U.S. funding for the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) after IARC scientists declared glyphosate a probable human carcinogen in March 2015.  The industry is also demanding that the Environmental Protection Agency fully repudiate the IARC classification and green-light continued use of glyphosate herbicides, which spell billions of dollars in sales annually to Monsanto and the agrichemical brethren.

The EPA has been evaluating glyphosate as part of a re-registration review process for more than five years, and was initially expected to complete that review last year. The EPA then said it would complete the review by the end of 2016, and now says it will be 2017 before it offers a final report. The work has been drawn out as the EPA wrestles with the IARC classification, which has both legal and economic implications for the agrichemical industry. The EPA had planned to hold four days of public meetings – over industry objections- to examine scientific research on glyphosate. But the industry, which deemed the meetings “unnecessary” and “inappropriate,”  successfully derailed   those Oct. 18-21 public meetings by challenging certain scientists appointed by EPA to an advisory panel. The EPA has “postponed” the meetings and has yet to reschedule.

Now, industry ally U.S. Rep. Lamar Smith is taking EPA officials to task for engaging with IARC on glyphosate concerns, demanding that EPA instead rely on the “sound science” that the industry promotes.  Smith, Chairman of the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology, accuses IARC of playing an “activist role” and EPA officials, of aiding that effort. In an Oct. 25 letter to EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy, Smith complained of “constant delays” by EPA in completing the re-registration of glyphosate, and demanded that EPA officials appear before his committee to explain themselves. Monsanto, which is fending off lawsuits by people who claim Roundup gave them cancer, has also been demanding IARC members turn over documents related to their work. The company has labeled the IARC findings as “junk science,” and claims the IARC members are part of an “unelected, undemocratic, foreign body.” 

It’s all a bit overwhelming for the members of the IARC working group, who are not accustomed to assaults on their character.  After all, these scientists that assembled for the glyphosate review were among the elite, routinely seen as independent experts, pulled from top institutions around the world. Frank Le Curieux, senior scientific officer at the European Chemicals Agency in Helsinki, Finland, and an expert in toxicology, was part of the team. So was French scientist Isabelle Baldi, who holds a Ph.D in epidemiology with a research specialty in environmental toxicology, and works as assistant professor in occupational epidemiology and public health at Bordeaux University. Experts also came from Australia, New Zealand, Canada, The Netherlands, and Nicaragua. Several came from the United States, including Matthew Martin, a biologist with the EPA’s National Center for Computational Toxicology who received awards for his work with toxicity data.  Aaron Blair, a scientist emeritus at the National Cancer Institute, served as chairman of the IARC team. Blair has specialty knowledge in research that focused on evaluating cancer and other disease risks associated with agricultural exposures, as well as chemicals in the workplace and the general environment. He has received numerous awards over his career and has served on many national and international scientific review groups, including for the EPA.  He has also authored more than 450 publications on occupational and environmental causes of cancer.

The fact that Monsanto and the agrichemical industry is coming after them has left them stunned. IARC issued a statement last week saying some also felt “intimidated” by the industry actions

“We were not expecting this strong reaction and what happened,” said Francesco Forastiere, head of occupational epidemiology at the Lazio Regional Health Service in Italy who participated in glyphosate working group for IARC. “We were doing our job. We understood there were other issues… economic consequences. But none of us had a political agenda. We simply acted as scientists, evaluating the body of evidence, according to the IARC criteria.”

Another working group member, Australian epidemiologist Lin Fritschi, who has been part of other IARC classifications, said the team’s work was solid and the industry attacks on the team’s credibility are unwarranted.

“I definitely wasn’t expecting anything at all,” said Fritschi, who specializes in the occupational causes of cancer and holds the “distinguished professor” title at Curtin University in Australia. “We were independent and just looked at the science.  We had strict rules on what was admissible and came to a conclusion based on that evidence. We made the right decision based on the evidence.”

The team was not charged with doing new research, but rather with reviewing research already conducted, trying to determine how the various findings added up. The members analyzed older research as well as more recent studies, weighed the methods used, the consistency of results and the levels of adherence to research standards.  There were numerous animal studies to pore over, but fewer looking at glyphosate connections to health problems in humans. The evidence with respect to cancer in humans came from studies of exposures, mostly in agricultural settings. The group determined that the best research showed a distinct association between non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) and glyphosate. The team also noted that there were ties linking glyphosate to multiple myeloma, but the evidence for that disease was not as strong as the evidence tying glyphosate to NHL, the group determined.

The team also evaluated several studies that showed animals developed rare kidney tumors and other health problems after exposure. Those studies combined to provide “sufficient evidence” of glyphosate’s carcinogenicity in laboratory animals, the IARC team found.  On top of that, the IARC team concluded that there was strong evidence of genotoxicity and oxidative stress from glyphosate, including findings of DNA damage in the peripheral blood of exposed humans. The team also said it was noteworthy that in one study, people showed chromosomal damage after glyphosate formulations were sprayed nearby.

Overall, IARC concluded that there was “limited evidence” that glyphosate can cause non-Hodgkin lymphoma and “convincing evidence” that glyphosate can cause cancer in laboratory animals. The conclusion would have been for “sufficient” evidence of cancer problems for humans, but for one large U.S. study run by the federal government that did not show connections between cancer and glyphosate, Forastiere said.

The team ultimately decided the weight of the evidence was not strong enough to say glyphosate was definitively carcinogenic, but there was more than enough evidence for the caveat “probably” carcinogenic.

Blair, Forastiere and the others said after the fact that they felt quite comfortable with the work of the IARC team and proud of the thoroughness of what was a complicated undertaking.

“We should all minimize our use as much as possible,” said Fritschi, “The people most at risk are people who use glyphosate a lot, such as farmers and gardeners, and they are the ones who should try and reduce their use,” she said.

Monsanto and other industry players can’t afford for that kind of talk to take root; which is exactly why we’re seeing these extraordinary efforts to undermine the scientists and push EPA to ignore cancer concerns.  One letter in particular submitted by CropLife America to EPA this month shows the depths of the industry’s efforts to rein in EPA’s probe of glyphosate. CropLife told the EPA it was out of line for proclaiming a need for independent research on formulated glyphosate products – such as Roundup. The agency said in September it has been collaborating with the National Toxicology Program of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences to develop a research plan to evaluate the role of glyphosate in product formulations and the differences in formulation toxicity. But apparently, it neglected to get industry permission.

“We also question why EPA would collaborate and develop a research program with the National Toxicology Program without input from the registrant,” CropLife wrote. “Should data be required to address specific questions relevant to the registration or reregistration of a product, the registrant would be the appropriate source of those data.”

The industry message to EPA is loud and clear: Independent research and international scientific findings should not take precedence over protection of a multi-billion-dollar agent like glyphosate. The public can only watch, wait, and hope that the EPA doesn’t listen.

(Article first appeared in The Huffington Post)