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Is Roundup as safe as we have been told?

39K views 215 replies 62 participants last post by  spreerider 
#1 ·
#115 ·
I'm in agreement with everything Dcoates said, except I only own 20 percent of a corporation that employs 20 people, but we provide supervision for oil and gas wells and Class I wells and turn some serious bucks for such a small company. Getting back to the bees, I see no ill effects of roundup on my bees are anyone else that I know that keeps bees and uses roundup. Quite a few beekeepers spray around their hives to keep weeds and grass from smothering their bee hives. I don't see ill effects from using roundup long term, but this type of study is not my cup of tea.
 
#119 ·
Nabber86, I love your article link regarding the dihydrogen monoxide. I have used it as a performance enhancing drug and also give it to my bees as a supplement. I believe I am addicted to it because it is great stuff and I just cant live without it. However, to get back on topic, yes Roundup may not be as safe a s claimed but every chemical you can use has unexpected consequences when used. Some are much worse than others. This stuff has been around a long time and nothing too bad has yet been linked to it. Use it if you need to, just don't use it in an irresponsible manner.
 
#122 ·
The comparison of asbestos to glyphosate is a poor one on a lot of levels but for starters, Asbestos is a naturally occurring substance that has been used by mankind commercially since the mid 1800's. I doubt there was ever an actual approval process just a gradual realization in the 1900's that lots of people with exposure seemed to be getting sick and dying.
 
#124 ·
The point is that low level exposures over a long period of time often prove quite different than heavy exposures of rats in a cage and sometimes those low level exposures over a long period of time are MORE dangerous. The lead water supply pipes the Romans used were probably causing them problems for a very long time and no one EVER noticed... We make a lot of assumptions about safety and they often prove wrong.

How may of you are going to put Roundup on your eggs for breakfast this morning? Yet you are probably eating some as we speak and some of you are comparing it to water?
 
#125 ·
How may of you are going to put Roundup on your eggs for breakfast this morning? Yet you are probably eating some as we speak and some of you are comparing it to water?
Come on now, can you prove there is Round Up in our eggs? You're grasping at straws. Common sense says not to put it on your food, that and the label says not to as well. That's improper use and it's not been tested for that. Does product have to be tested for 100 years for any/every eventuality before you would be accepted it?
 
#126 ·
If you put peppers in your eggs then you are probably eating not only round up, but many other chemicals. Unless you are using organic peppers. According to Nurishing Traditions it's one of the "dirty dozen". Is it in your water? If you have public water I'd venture to say yes. Have you looked at your water report / statement lately? My bees that are on that farm (they won't be next year) drink from the lake no doubt that is the run off of the fields. There's a scum on the top of the water. The only fish that are in the pond are very small minnows. I wonder why they can't grow bigger? I would love to have that water tested. Oh and it's not stagnant water either. There is a small run off there at least when the water level is high enough. There were several dead fish there last winter / spring. I didn't even think about it then. Same as my hives that are there. Many are dead. It may not be just round-up, but he uses other herbocides. He told me the other day that "every field has herbocides". I don't remember and I'm not going to go back and reread through everything here, but what's the 1/2 life of round-up? If it's sprayed ears on end and then you have onions planted it's going to be in the onions. If your chickens eat the grain from those fields then your eggs have it in them. Do you only buy eggs that are produced from organically fed chickens? Then there's your answer. How many tons of it has been sprayed in the US last year again? Perhaps Michael Bush isn't "grasping at straws" as one may think.
 
#129 ·
If you put peppers in your eggs then you are probably eating not only round up, but many other chemicals. Unless you are using organic peppers. According to Nurishing Traditions it's one of the "dirty dozen". Is it in your water? If you have public water I'd venture to say yes. Have you looked at your water report / statement lately? My bees that are on that farm (they won't be next year) drink from the lake no doubt that is the run off of the fields. There's a scum on the top of the water. The only fish that are in the pond are very small minnows. I wonder why they can't grow bigger? I would love to have that water tested. Oh and it's not stagnant water either. There is a small run off there at least when the water level is high enough. There were several dead fish there last winter / spring. I didn't even think about it then. Same as my hives that are there. Many are dead. It may not be just round-up, but he uses other herbocides. He told me the other day that "every field has herbocides". I don't remember and I'm not going to go back and reread through everything here, but what's the 1/2 life of round-up? If it's sprayed ears on end and then you have onions planted it's going to be in the onions. If your chickens eat the grain from those fields then your eggs have it in them. Do you only buy eggs that are produced from organically fed chickens? Then there's your answer. How many tons of it has been sprayed in the US last year again? Perhaps Michael Bush isn't "grasping at straws" as one may think.

You are just plain wrong on much of that:

There can be no glyphosate on peppers, because as anyone who has sprayed a little too close and up-wind of their garden knows, that slightest amount of drifting glyphosate that hits a pepper plant will kill the plant overnight. Other pesticides yes.

They are called the dirty dozen because you are supposed to wash the veggies before you eat them.

The clean 15 should also be washed.

Organic veggies have traces of pesticides as well and they should be washed too.

I look at my water report at least 2 times per year, do you? From Water One (my local supply company: Each year more than 18,000 samples are collected and nearly 120,000 tests are conducted to ensure our water is clean and safe. I check the water report every year and here is one for 2014: http://www.waterone.org/home/showdocument?id=392 Do you see any pesticides? Can you post a copy of your water report? Do you know anything about water quality? Can you even read the results of a water report correctly?

The scum on the pond water is from nutrient loading, not pesticides. Dead fish = nutrient loading again. The algae depletes the oxygen levels that fish need to survive. And yes you should test the water, because without so, you have absolutely no basis for you argument. You say the water is covered with scum yet it is not stagnant. Those conditions are mutually exclusive.

Maybe you minnows are well, minnows. What makes you think they are the fry of a larger species such as largemouth bass. Have the owner of the pond call the local extension office and they will tell him how to take care of the pond and establish a healthy fish population (that is if he wants to, he may not care to raise healthy fish).

Glyphosate does not bioaccumulate in birds or mammals. This is very easy to prove. Chicken eggs cannot be contaminated with glyphosate.
 
#128 ·
It is not just 40 years of our exposure. How many animals have been fed and raised on GMO, roundup sprayed, corn and soybean? Comparing the testing or lack there of PCB, asbestos, and DDT is nuts. I really wish we could live in a chemical free environment, but reality does not support it.
Dave
 
#131 ·
>You're grasping at straws.

It's already found in your food:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0308814613019201

Your water supply:
Cox, C. "Glyphosate, Part 2: Human Exposure and Ecological Effects." Journal of Pesticide Reform Winter 1995 Vol. 15, No 4.

Your urine:
http://www.foeeurope.org/sites/default/files/glyphosate_studyresults_june12.pdf
http://www.globalresearch.ca/gmo-an...er-found-in-human-urine-across-europe/5338868
(a study I can't get to because of internet blocking says US urine samples were 10 times the ones in Europe, which considering the use of GMO's here makes sense)

And even human breast milk at much higher levels than urine.
http://sustainablepulse.com/2014/04...covered-u-s-mothers-breast-milk/#.U-4lfNlOndc

You think that the chickens who eat the contaminated roundup ready grain don't have it in their system and their eggs? I would consider that EXTREMELY unlikely...
 
#136 · (Edited)
The breast milk study is bogus. The so-called report list all kinds of data and states claims that are unsupported. There is absolutely no study that backs the claims up. If you click on a few of the links that look like references you get caught in a goose chase of several eco-warrior websites that re-references themselves in a giant CJ. I don't get my science info from internet blogs with an obvious agenda. I did enjoy the Moms Across American Blog complete with a picture of a lovely young mother nursing an angelic child. How precious. I dont know why I am doing this , but if you want to fight blog against blog, here are a few for you. Actually, just read the first one for a well written critique of the "study":

http://academicsreview.org/2014/04/...-health-risk-claims-about-glyphosate-roundup/

http://kfolta.blogspot.com/2013/04/the-gullible-moms-across-america-post.html

https://skeptoid.com/blog/2013/05/03/mercolawatchsupposed-report-comparing-gmo-and-non-gmo-corn/

http://www.geneticliteracyproject.o...to-replicate-the-anti-ge-stunning-corn-study/

If you want to discuss science, please find the studies that the provided the data. I am not finding one credible science website that is supporting this study.

It is the same exact thing with the European urine thing*. It is posted on literally every eco-website in existence, buy there is not one reference to the actual study. The only thing that I could find is reference to an article in a German newspaper. Of course it is written in German, so that is no help. It is not supported by any science-based organization.

Glyphosate in our drinking water?? The report that you references a farm pond that was contaminated with Ag. runoff and another pond where a glyphosate spill had occurred. They took surface water samples and found glyphosate. Contaminated farm ponds are not part of my water supply.

Groundwater? They said that they found glyphosate i well in Texas and 6 in Virginia. There is no mention if these wells are irrigation wells, monitoring wells that were installed at a glyphosate spill site, stock wells, or heat pump wells. The wells could have supply wells on farms. Farm well are particularly notorious for being contaminated by the owner. These wells are typically not maintained and located downgradient of spills and septic field lines.

Our food?? The report that you referenced indicates that they found glyphosate in Roundup Ready soybeans that were sprayed with Roundup. No surprises there. It's is really easy to test for glyphosate. Where is the contaminated egg report?

Anyway if we want to talk science, let's start with articles that have a little more credibility.


EDIT:
>Glyphosate does not bioaccumulate in birds or mammals.
Yet it showed up in human breast milk... at higher levels than the urine of the same person... kind of a contradiction don't you think?
Actually glysophate passed in urine or expressed in breast milk means that it is water soluble and does not bioaccumulate. It's a pretty basic concept that is often not understood.





*Reminds me of a joke. If you are American when you go into the bathroom and American when you come out of the bathroom, what are you when you are in the bathroom?

.

.

.

.

European
 
#133 ·
Let's assume it's in there. You're still grasping at straws. There's still no scientifically acceptable/repeatable proof it does anything at all in those numbers. If it did, the environmental organizations/lawyers would be all over this. Folks can worry themselves all they want about every niggling issue they can find. We're still all going to die. There's still no proof Round up speeds up the process for anything but the grass it's sprayed on. I'm not going to waste my precious time worrying about Round Up. It's been on the market for 40 years and I firmly believe others shouldn't waste their precious time worrying about it either.
 
#137 ·
I can't even remember all of the chemicals that were commonly used in my lifetime that I was assured were "perfectly safe" and then turned out to be so dangerous that they were totally banned. I could list a half a dozen off the top of my head, but there is probably no point. The number of studies on the contamination level of glyphosate in groundwater and streams is large in itself and done by such disreputable groups as the US Geological Survey and the EPA. There are also plenty of studies showing contamination of our food. USGS ranked glyphosate as the #2 contaminate in groundwater in Wyoming (Pesticides in Wyoming groundwater, 2008 ?10 by Cheryl A. Eddy-Miller, Timothy T. Bartos) (and I'm sure it's used more in corn country like Nebraska than WY). The number of studies show glyphosate is dangerous is even longer. If anyone cares to see that point of view you could find them on scholar.google.com by the hundreds. I see no point in quoting them all here for people who have already made up their minds.
 
#140 ·
From another forum where the topic of glyphosate safety was being "discussed" a link to the same study was posted:

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2013/07/30/glyphosate-toxicity.aspx

The following is not my response, but it sums up my thoughts better than I have been able to do so far.

It's good that you're doing research on this, but these certainly aren't authoritative sources. Keep in mind that, with any controversial issue, you'll get credible sounding sources that confirm whatever viewpoint you like. It's very important to be critical of said sources.
Scientific American is not a publisher of primary research. It's science journalism, not a research publication.


Ecotoxicology is a low-impact journal (meaning the research it publishes it not frequently cited, and therefore generally not high-quality). If you want to contradict a large body of evidence as there exists in the glyphosate literature, you'd expect a higher-tier journal with stronger peer review. A quick look at the methods does not give me any confidence that these results will be replicated.


Toxicology is better journal, but the article in question isn't about glyphosate at all. It's about the other ingredients in herbicide formulations and how that can interact various chemicals and the environment. This is a legitimate concern, but is in no way unique to glyphosate. Their inclusion of that last paragraph about affecting pregnancy is extremely suspect, as their study is limited to tissue culture studies. It's very easy to get effects in tissue culture, and lots of perfectly safe chemicals will show similar effects in such experiments. Based on that alone, I suspect that the authors are biased and have an agenda, though I'd need to read the paper more thoroughly to decide.


The main site you link to, Mercola, is in no way reputable. It invokes chemicals as evil all over and advocates 'natural' medicine that is essentially snake-oil.


This is blatant cherry-picking of the data; it really isn't hard to see that.
 
#149 ·
Am I missing something here? ND = “Not detected” however they have a number after it. If this isn’t the number of what they detected then what is it? It’s under the
“Maximum Contaminant Level (MCL): The highest level of a contaminant allowed in drinking water.”
but it’s still read. If this isn’t the amount “in your water” then what is it? What he was saying that it “didn’t need any action” seems to be a viable and correct thought.

Looking at Altrazine 3 ppb is allowed while they detected .2 ppb. To me that seems like it’s in the water. Although small what other explanation is there?
 
#150 ·
Am I missing something here? ND = “Not detected” however they have a number after it. If this isn’t the number of what they detected then what is it? It’s under the “Maximum Contaminant Level (MCL): The highest level of a contaminant allowed in drinking water.”
but it’s still read. If this isn’t the amount “in your water” then what is it? What he was saying that it “didn’t need any action” seems to be a viable and correct thought.

Looking at Altrazine 3 ppb is allowed while they detected .2 ppb. To me that seems like it’s in the water. Although small what other explanation is there?
ND means that it was not detected down to a level of 0.2 ppb, not that is was detected at 0.2 ppb (if it was detected at 0.2 ppb, the ND flag would not appear next to the value in the table). It’s as simple as that. The only question that remains is if there is atrazine present at some level below 0.2 ppb, what is that level? But I am not going to get into the "If a tree falls in the woods with nobody there..." discussion because it is patently absurd to go there.

The Maximum Contaminant Level (MCL) for atrazine is the federally mandated (Safe Drinking Water Act) maximum amount of atrazine that the EPA has decided is safe for your drinking water. For atrazine the MCL is 3 ppb. Now that is where the problems begin. A lot of people do not trust the EPA and do not accept that 3 ppb atrazine in your drinking water as being safe. Please realize that I do not want to drink water with 3 ppb of atrazine and I am not promoting the MCL concept, I am just trying to tell people how the system works. When I see a ND of 0.2 ppb and an MCL that is 15 times higher than the detection level (3 ppb), it is the end of the story for me and I am drinking my tap water. If atrazine was detected at any level (below or above the MCL) I would be worried, but I have never seen any positive hits, and the detection limit have been low, so as far as I am concerned,; it is not there. However, If they detect atrazine above the MCL (say 4 ppb), somebody is going to pay for the cleanup. Luckily for me, I am the one that gets paid to do the cleanup.

A couple of other points:

You can have high detection limits due to shoddy lab work or, most likely, due to multiple dilutions of the water sample. This can be a real problem. Detections levels are not static and can change with every test. Say you get a ND (4 ppb) and the MCL is 3 ppb. That means that it was not detected at 4 ppb, but the MCL is lower than that. Again, you avoid the "tree in the woods argument" and simply re-test the water until you get actual detects, or non-detects under 3 ppb.

Just because atrazine is on the MCL list, it doesn’t mean that there has ever been a problem with atrazine in the drinking water in your area. The MCL list is what every public water supply system has to test for.

The MCL list is really short. There are hundreds of thousands of other chemicals out there that are not on the list and are not tested for (how does that make you feel?).

A public water supply has a strict definition. If you live in a small community with a limited tie-ins, or rely on a private supply well, nobody is testing the water.
 
#151 ·
There seem to be a lot of very trusting people posting here. I kind of wish I were one of them, but I can't quite bring myself to trust in the accuracy of a company's self-testing of its product, when a bad result would cost them a lot of money. There are so many examples of this sort of trust being misplaced.

One issue that I haven't noticed getting much discussion is the fact that increasingly, noxious weeds are developing resistance to Roundup, so that the manufacturer is recommending additional other herbicides, some of which may not be as well-tested as Roundup.

And again, most of the testing of glyphosate has been done using money from the industry.

How much you want to trust a company that makes billions from a product is up to you, I guess.
 
#152 ·
Some people like to think of the glass as half empty, other half full. If a new product was known to consistently cause health problems and scientifically consistent manner when tested why in God's green earth would they introduce it? The truth will come out eventually and they'll pay out in spades. The very profit they made on it will be returned many fold and the advertising black eye will last for years assuming the company survives it. This doesn't even bring into play the very scientists, corporate officers, and employees, who designed it, tested it, made it and sold it. They would knowingly unleashing something that they and their own kids and possibly future generations could be negatively affected by?

It's simply not logical and isn't a good business practice.

As for testing shouldn't the company that produced it also test it? We've modified or even killed products and projects that were found unsafe in testing. Did we lose money? Yep, but it was one heck of a lot less than we would have lost had we continued with the project. Business involves risk, but you have learn it to understand it to minimize it if you can. If you can't, the project is dead. Introducing a product that is known to cause trouble is like sowing landmines that activate at an unknown time in the future under the very ground you trod daily. Does this scenario fit with conspiracy theorists who believe corporations are inherently evil and would push a nun down a flight of stairs for money? Nope, but it's what happens in 99% of the real corporate world.
 
#156 ·
Some people like to think of the glass as half empty, other half full. If a new product was known to consistently cause health problems and scientifically consistent manner when tested why in God's green earth would they introduce it?

.
Because human beings are imperfect, and sometimes make mistakes?

Initial testing is necessarily short term. As you imply, it is impractical to test every conceivable possibility for many years before putting a product on the market.

I'm not trying to attack the Job Creators (Peace be upon Them). I'm just saying that I'm a little less convinced of their saintliness than some folks are.

When I was a kid, I think that manufacturers might have been a little more concerned with the quality of their product. Now they seem to be more concerned about short term bottom line issues. The GM ignition switch debacle is an example of a situation where a well-respected American corporation concealed a flaw in their product that resulted in a number of fatalities.

It happens. And subtle effects on human health are such a nebulous and almost subjective field, compared to engines that suddenly stop running.

I'm a believer in the precautionary principle. Do we really need Roundup?

No. Or at the very least, we don't need it as much as the manufacturer needs to keep selling it.
 
#153 ·
I was involved with the final testing of a selective grass killer for use in agricultural crops. It was very effective without having any damaging effects on broad leaf plants. Not even at 10X the maximum recommended dose. I do not remember now which chemical company was developing it. They had spent a lot of money in the development of the herbicide, but it was dropped cold turkey because there was a very low indication of carcinogenicity in mice. If I remember right, and this happened more than 30 years ago, they had 1 mouse in the test group that develop a cancer.

rhaldridge if the farmers had been rotating chemicals from the start, they would not now be dealing with roundup resistance. There are few pesticides that if used continuously like roundup has been that would not have resistance development.
Dave
 
#160 ·
Na we dont really need it but I think the social unrest globally that would result from the increased grain production cost would be far less acceptable. Spiking costs of basic food was a common denominator in the Arab Spring uprisings. How far are we from social unrest re living standards in the US? A lot of us get wrapped around the emotional axle over some pet cause but give no thought to the big picture cause of our predicament. My opinion is that a lot of this "feel good" environmental posturing. Drinking from the trough of indignation!
 
#164 ·
Really good discussion in /r/science regarding GMOs, pesticides, super weeds, feeding the world, Monsanto, etc. There are several PhDs and grad students involved and they are pretty much talking in plain English. There is a lot of really good info being exchanged, and surprisingly, very little name calling and animosity.

I suggest everyone that is participating in this thread spend a few hours reading this:

http://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/2dz07o/science_ama_series_ask_me_anything_about/
 
#166 ·
>This thread makes you wonder what type and duration of testing a "precautionist" would accept before introducing an exotic species like Apis mellifera to the U.S.

How about allowing European Homo sapiens into the country... they could carry deadly diseases... I'm with the "precautionists..."
 
#170 ·
>Wut, wait, are you saying that we should not let Europeans into the US?

I'm saying we already did. And it was a disaster. Smallpox. Flu. Typhoid. Measles. Cholera. Bubonic plague. Tuberculosis. Mumps. Yellow fever. Pertussis. And then there were the soldiers... Tens of millions died.
 
#172 · (Edited)
I'm saying we already did. And it was a disaster. Smallpox. Flu. Typhoid. Measles. Cholera. Bubonic plague. Tuberculosis. Mumps. Yellow fever. Pertussis. And then there were the soldiers... Tens of millions died.
Uh, with that thinking... let's get rid of the human race? Without the human race none of those things would have occurred... How long have we been around again? Are you saying we should have been tested before releasing? Who's doing that testing? It appears we're a failure from what's listed above. Who's in charge of cancelling this failed "project?"

What about fire? Can we use fire? It's been around since creation but it's been involved in killing trillions of creatures and is now supposedly causing "Global Cooling" (oops), "Warming" (never mind), "Climate Change" (for now). By the type of thinking in the quote above, fire could be claimed to be a disaster as well.

This whole thread is about whether Round Up is as safe as we've been told. You indicated it's not been tested long enough, though it's been on the market for +40 years and there's no substantial evidence that it's dangerous to humans or bees. Straws were being grasped at then, now air is being grasping at. Being precautionist is one thing but now it appears there's no amount of testing that will satisfy.

Wait..., are you pulling a trolling page from WLC or Acebird's playbooks or is this actually what you believe?
 
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