Another Round Up on Roundup

How does it feel to know you may have a toxic weedkiller in your body? See what a NEW CDC study found.

Photo by Scott Goodwill on Unsplash

Funny, a year ago at this time we were talking all about glyphosate, a widely used chemical herbicide spread on U.S. farms since 1974.

In fact, each year more than 200 million pounds of glyphosate are used by U.S. farmers on their fields. Not a small amount!

PAN North America @pesticideaction

Every year, over 200 million pounds of #glyphosate are applied to U.S. farmlands. While it’s certainly disturbing, we’re not exactly surprised to hear the @CDCgov found glyphosate in over 80% of U.S. urine samples.

It’s also the second most used pesticide in the home and garden market, sold around the world as the popular Roundup brand and in other brands.

This year, there’s buzz about a new report from the CDC, which discovered that more than 80 percent of urine samples from children and adults in the U.S. have detectable traces of glyphosate.

For years, scientists have been calling for more studies to help us monitor and understand the extent of human exposure to this weedkiller, especially to vulnerable populations like children, and now we have more data.

The CDC study found that of 2,310 urine samples, representative of the U.S. population, 1,885 contained glyphosate. Nearly a third of the samples in the study by the U.S. National Nutrition Examination Survey came from school-age children and 87 percent of the children tested had glyphosate in their urine. Yikes!

Now let’s be clear. Detectable levels don’t necessarily mean poisonous levels but this major study furthers our understanding of scope and how many people have already been exposed to this chemical compound. And it’s only a matter of time until more science exposes the potential health risks.

How Do I Tell My Neighbor To Stop Using Roundup?

Don’t miss our article from last year that talked about corruption at the EPA, which has repeatedly sided with the pesticide industry and downplayed the risks of glyphosate exposure to human health.

“I expect that the realization that most of us have glyphosate in our urine will be disturbing to many people,” Lianne Sheppard, professor at the University of Washington’s department of environmental and occupational health sciences in a told The Guardian in a recent article.

Let’s not forget the science we have so far on glyphosate.

In March 2015, the International Agency for Research on Cancer, or IARC, an arm of the World Health Organization, classified glyphosate as “probably carcinogenic to humans.” The 17-member panel of scientists reviewed almost 1,000 peer-reviewed, published studies on the potential carcinogenicity of the chemical. 

Want to know an interesting industry fact about this research? An internal Monsanto document identified the Center for Food Integrity, an industry-funded nonprofit, as an “industry partner” in Monsanto’s public relations plan to help discredit this research arm and to protect the reputation of Roundup weedkiller. Read more about it here.

In April 2019, the U.S. Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry released an analysis that on studies connecting glyphosate and non-Hodgkin lymphoma, and recommended monitoring children’s exposure to this toxic weedkiller.

Sheppard co-authored a 2019 analysis that found glyphosate exposure increased the risk of non-Hodgkin lymphoma, and also co-authored a 2019 scientific paper that reviewed 19 studies documenting glyphosate in human urine.

Last month a federal appeals court issued an opinion ordering the EPA to give “further consideration” to evidence of glyphosate risks.

In July 2020, the Environmental Working Group (EWG), a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization released an analysis of laboratory testing that shows glyphosate in more than 90 percent of non-organic hummus and chickpea samples. 

Previous tests by EWG and other public interest groups have found glyphosate in popular breakfast cereals and other foods American adults and children love to eat, like Cheerios and Quaker Instant Oatmeal.

Here we go again making humans into guinea pigs instead of taking a more cautionary approach.

We need to increase budgets for science and health advisory boards so that they can keep up their important public health work.

Please don’t forget that this chemical has been a huge moneymaker for a private company for years and years.

Glyphosate was invented and marketed by Monsanto until 2018. Then Bayer bought the company for $63 billion and inherited liability to the tune of more than 125,000 claims by people who say the products caused their cancer.

The company announced in 2021 that glyphosate will no longer be sold for residential use in the U.S. by 2023. 

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Interestingly, another study came out just this month about the detrimental effects of pesticides and heavy metals in soil on the cardiovascular system.

“Soil contamination is a less visible danger to human health than dirty air,” said study author Professor Thomas Münzel of the University Medical Center Mainz, Germany. “But evidence is mounting that pollutants in soil may damage cardiovascular health through a number of mechanisms including inflammation and disrupting the body's natural clock.”

This review paper published in Cardiovascular Research, a journal of the European Society of Cardiology, says that pollution of air, water, and soil is responsible for at least nine million deaths each year.

It also reports that more than 60 percent of pollution-related disease and death is due to cardiovascular disease such as chronic ischaemic heart disease, heart attack, stroke and heart rhythm disorders (arrhythmias).

What’s the number one cause of death in America? Heart Disease.

This paper highlights the relationships between soil pollution and human health, defining soil pollutants as heavy metals, pesticides, and plastics.

Contaminated soil may lead to cardiovascular disease by increasing oxidative stress in the blood vessels and by causing inflammation, according to the study authors.

They explain that contaminated soil can enter the body by inhaling desert dust, fertilizer crystals, or plastic particles. Heavy metals such as cadmium and lead, plastics, and pesticides can also be consumed orally. Soil pollutants also wash into rivers and create dirty water which may be consumed.

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Feeling nervous about soil pollution from Roundup and other pesticides? Let us know in the comments below!