Study Finds Almost All Sanitary Cotton Products Contaminated with Probable Carcinogen

Posted on October 23, 2015 by Robert Barsocchini

http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2015/10/study-finds-almost-all-sanitary-cotton-products-contaminated-with-probable-carcinogen.html

85 percent of sanitary cotton products tested in a new study were contaminated with glyphosate, which was recently ruled a “probable carcinogen” by the World Health Organization and is the main ingredient in Monsanto’s herbicide Roundup, used worldwide.

Roundup is applied to cotton plants “when the bud is open and the glyphosate is condensed and goes straight into the product,” one of the researchers reported.

The studied products were purchased in Argentina, which receives them from Brazil, including via the US.

RT notes that “[s]cientific studies have linked the chemicals in Monsanto’s biocides [such as Agent Orange] to Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s disease, autism and cancer.”

Common Weedkiller Used in Modern Agriculture Could be Main Factor in Gluten Intolerance

Wheat has taken quite a beating in recent years, being blamed for all sorts of diseases and illnesses. The rise of gluten intolerant conditions like Celiac disease has led to an increase in negative attitudes towards wheat. Gluten is the protein in wheat that is difficult to digest in so many people. Some have gone so far as to propose that wheat was never meant to be part of the food chain, and it is treated as if it is a form of poison.

However, there are always several factors to consider when looking at gluten sensitivity. First, as we have pointed out in other places, it is always dangerous to classify a food group as a static entity, such as a mineral in the periodic table of elements. Food is alive, and not static. There are multiple varieties and cultivars, as well as multiple growing conditions that make it nearly impossible to simply make sweeping generalizations about any agricultural product, including wheat. Any statement starting out as “Wheat is” or “Wheat does” risks making the statement almost meaningless without further defining what kind of wheat, and in what form.

There are probably few foods so controversial today as wheat. Yet most people’s experience with wheat as a food is in highly processed industrial food products. There is increased interest in recent times in ancient grains, the precursors to modern wheat. While wheat does not yet exist in the market place as a genetically modified product, it has been hybridized quite extensively over its long history to produce the common varieties we have now in the food system. There are some studies showing that some of these ancient grains are more easily digested and tolerated by those with gluten sensitivities.

The other factor that gets almost no attention when discussing the negative effects of modern wheat, is the fact that it could possibly be an innocent bystander, rather than a causative factor in sensitivities that result in poor digestion. For one thing, gluten is not the only protein Americans are having problems digesting. Similar problems exist with casein (from dairy) and other proteins.

Not only has wheat changed over the years into the modern era, so too has our digestive system. There are many culprits in destroying our digestive systems from being able to digest complex proteins, including our record levels of consuming pharmaceutical products. There is research showing that probiotics can reduce or eliminate gluten sensitivity, lending evidence that this is primarily a digestive issue. (See: Probiotics Prevent Gluten Sensitivity and Intestinal Damage from Gliadin)

The blame-game attacks against an entire food group, in this case wheat, reminds me a lot of the attacks against dietary cholesterol in the 1970s, when cholesterol was classified as something slightly less than poison. As it turns out, cholesterol has simply been wrongly convicted as an innocent bystander, as cholesterol is essential to life.

So we come to the most recent research published by Dr. Stephanie Seneff. Her research is not new here at Health Impact News. Dr. Seneff was one of the first to link statin drug use and artificially lowering cholesterol levels with Alzheimer’s Disease back in 2011. (See: The Clue to Why Low Fat Diet and Statins may Cause Alzheimer’s) She is a controversial scientist with three degrees from MIT who is not constrained by Big Pharma funding.

In her most recent research published in a peer-reviewed journal along with Anthony Samsel, she looks at the role of glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup, which is the most popular herbicide used worldwide, and its toxic effect in destroying our digestive system. Here is another piece of the problem when looking at gluten sensitivities. In a recent interview she was asked about glyphosate’s role in Celiac disease and gluten sensitivities, and this was her reply:

Gluten sensitivity by itself doesn’t necessarily have the transglutaminase immunogenicity of Celiac. It shares the same features with Celiac disease, but it’s not as extreme. But these things also have a host of other pathologies that are associated with this particular condition of gluten sensitivity, which is what’s so fascinating to me. All of these risk factors that co-occur with Celiac disease could be explained through other ways that glyphosate disrupts physiology. That’s the most fascinating thing to me, is that you can explain all of these other things, maybe not directly through the effect of gluten but through the effect of glyphosate on the body.

People who have Celiac disease have increased risk for other things; for example, non-hodgkins lymphoma, and they die earlier because of these other risks. They also have fertility problems, they are more likely to produce children with birth defects, and are more likely to have depression and serotonin problems. All of these things that are connected to Celiac disease, but also exist independently from Celiac disease, are also caused, in our opinion, by glyphosate. (Source)

Read the full study online free here.

Here is the Conclusion of the study:

This paper presents an exhaustive review of the toxic effects of the herbicide, glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup®, in humans, and demonstrates how glyphosate’s adverse effects on the gut microbiota, in conjunction with its established ability to inhibit the activity of cytochrome P450 enzymes, and its likely impairment of sulfate transport, can remarkably explain a great number of the diseases and conditions that are prevalent in the modern industrialized world. Its effects are insidious, because the long-term effects are often not immediately apparent. The pathologies to which glyphosate could plausibly contribute, through its known biosemiotic effects, include inflammatory bowel disease, obesity, depression, ADHD, autism, Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, ALS, multiple sclerosis, cancer, cachexia, infertility, and developmental malformations. Glyphosate works synergistically with other factors, such as insufficient sun exposure, dietary deficiencies in critical nutrients such as sulfur and zinc, and synergistic exposure to other xenobiotics whose detoxification is impaired by glyphosate.

Given the known toxic effects of glyphosate reviewed here and the plausibility that they are negatively impacting health worldwide, it is imperative for more independent research to take place to validate the ideas presented here, and to take immediate action, if they are verified, to drastically curtail the use of glyphosate in agriculture. Glyphosate is likely to be pervasive in our food supply, and, contrary to being essentially nontoxic, it may in fact be the most biologically disruptive chemical in our environment.

Source:

Glyphosate’s Suppression of Cytochrome P450 Enzymes and Amino Acid Biosynthesis by the Gut Microbiome: Pathways to Modern Diseases

Anthony Samsel and Stephanie Seneff – Entropy 2013, 15, 1416-1463

See Also:

Glyphosate, pathways to modern diseases II: Celiac sprue and gluten intolerance

Anthony Samsel and Stephanie Seneff - Interdiscip Toxicol. 2013; Vol. 6 (4): 159–184.

LINK to Article: http://healthimpactnews.com/2014/common-weedkiller-used-in-modern-agriculture-could-be-main-factor-in-gluten-intolerance/

Is it the gluten or is it the glyphosate?

New evidence points to glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup, as the culprit in the rise of gluten intolerance, celiac disease and irritable bowel syndrome. A study just published in the Journal of Interdisciplinary Toxicology (Vol. 6(4): 159–184 ) by Anthony Samsel and Stephanie Seneff explains how the nearly ubiquitous use of glyphosate as a crop desiccant is entering our food chain and making us ill.

http://www.examiner.com/article/is-it-the-gluten-or-is-it-the-glyphosate

Pre-harvest application of glyphosate to wheat and barley as a desiccant was suggested as early as 1980 and its use as a drying agent 7-10 days before harvest has since become routine. It is now used on all grain crops, rice, seeds, dried beans and peas, sugar cane, sweet potatoes, and sugar beets. According to the Pulse Growers Association in Canada (legume growers), “Desiccants are used worldwide by growers who are producing crops that require 'drying down' to create uniformity of plant material at harvest. These products may also assist in pre-harvest weed control. In Canada, products such as diquat (Reglone) and glyphosate (Roundup) have been used as desiccants in pulse crops in the past, and there are new products on the way. ”
The percentage of the total acreage of wheat in the US treated with glyphosate in 1998 and 2012 is shown in Table 1 (slide show).
Samsel & Seneff state that in 2004 glyphosate was used to treat 13% of the wheat in the UK and by 2006, 94% of UK growers used glyphosate on 40% of cereal and 80% of oilseed crops for weed control or harvest management. According to a 2012 report on glyphosate residues in food in the UK, residues as high as 1.1 parts per million [ppm] were detected in whole wheat flour. Lesser residues were detected in a wide range of breads. Residues of 0.6 ppm were found in dried lentils and peas, 2.7 ppm in dried beans, and 11 ppm in dried chickpeas.
Despite multiple letters and documents submitted in protest, just last July the EPA raised the maximum allowable residues of glyphosate in our food, most likely to accommodate levels already present. Allowed levels for various crops where desiccants are routinely used are shown in Table 2 (slide show).

In 2009 Gasnier et al. published an article in the journal Toxicology citing evidence that glyphosate-based herbicides are endocrine disruptors in human cells. They reported toxic effects to liver cells “at 5 ppm, and the first endocrine disrupting actions at 0.5 ppm.”

Samsel & Seneff have meticulously researched the known (published) effects of glyphosate along with the known (published) pathologies associated with celiac disease, gluten intolerance and irritable bowel syndrome. They have identified chemical and biological pathways where glyphosate can be the cause. These are: disruption of the gut bacteria; breakdown in the junctions of the intestinal wall; depletion of vital minerals, vitamins and nutrients; and impairment of cytochrome enzymes that aid the liver in detoxifying environmental toxins, thus multiplying the deleterious effect of other environmental toxins to which we are exposed in increasing amounts.

The increase in the amount of glyphosate applied to wheat correlates with the rise of celiac disease, peritonitis, and deaths due to intestinal infection (see slide show). Samsel and Seneff argue that the increases in these diseases not only have an environmental factor, but not all patient's symptoms are alleviated by eliminating gluten from the diet, which points to another cause.
Data sources:
glyphosate applications to wheat: USDA: National Agricultural Statistics Service
Hospital discharge data: CDC: 1991-2005 2006-2010
Mortality data: CDC mortality database

How glyphosate is being whitewashed for its review in the EU and the US

http://farmwars.info/?p=12169


Compiled by Rosemary Mason MB ChB FRCA, on behalf of a global network of independent scientists, beekeepers and environmentalists

Farm Wars

Last week the G8 Conference was held in London to discuss the problem of the massive increases in the incidence of dementia in the Western World.[1]

The herbicide glyphosate will be reviewed by Germany, the Rapporteur Member State, in 2014. The review of glyphosate was due to take place in 2012. Soon after the European Commission was notified of the latest research showing that glyphosate and Roundup® caused birth defects, it quietly passed a directive delaying the review of glyphosate and 38 other dangerous pesticides until 2015.[2]

There are two research papers that the German Regulatory Authorities will find the hardest to ignore when they study new evidence that has arisen since glyphosate was last reviewed in 2002. It is crucial that industry eliminates these studies from consideration.
•Séralini, G.-E., et al. Long term toxicity of a Roundup® herbicide and a Roundup® tolerant genetically modified maize. Food Chem. Toxicol. (2012). Séralini’s 2-year feeding study provoked chronic hormone and sex dependent pathologies in rats; males developed tumours at 4 months and females at 7 months.[3]

What Séralini’s team discovered in rats is happening in humans and animals.
•Samsel, A., Seneff, S. Glyphosate’s Suppression of Cytochrome P450 Enzymes and Amino Acid Biosynthesis by the Gut Microbiome: Pathways to Modern Diseases. Entropy 2013, 15, 1-x manuscripts; doi:10.3390/ e140x000x.[4]

What Samsel and Seneff discovered was that glyphosate/Roundup® interferes with many metabolic processes in plants, animals and humans. Glyphosate is an endocrine disruptor and it damages DNA and is a driver of mutations that lead to cancer.

Dr Nancy Swanson has constructed graphs (from USDA and US CDC data) of a correlation between glyphosate applied to crops and % GM corn and soy planted, to the incidence and prevalence of various diseases of those on a Western diet.[5]

Séralini’s research was successfully retracted (14 months after it appeared in the journal) by appointing a Monsanto Scientist as an Associate Editor (he also retracted another paper that was dangerous to the GM industry showing that Bt insecticidal toxins were not broken down in digestion and were toxic to mice). There have been attempts by the Publishers to retract the Samsel and Seneff paper, but the Editor-in-Chief and the authors have made a firm stand.
•My outgoing emails (3-years’-worth) were destroyed 3 weeks ago by a British agency, at the same time as Anthony Samsel’s computer was hacked; fortunately his quick thinking saved his files. Who would want to destroy my emails and why? Because I had a document they needed to destroy before they could retract Séralini’s rat study.
•I had sent this document on 22nd October 2012 to Dirk Detken, Chief Attorney for the European Food Safety Authority, Subject: EFSA and the Séralini paper on rat tumours. I told him that Monsanto had already done “experiments” in humans in South America with GM Roundup® Ready soy: the farmers and their families had been affected by birth defects, reproductive problems, cancers and DNA changes shown on blood tests.[6] Fortunately my letter is still linked to a website.[7]
•The reason for the disappearance of emails from my SENT box, between March 2012 and mid-July 2012 became obvious. In response to an EU Press Release: 06/2012 Ombudsman investigates whether the Commission should do more to combat bee mortality we complained, not only about pesticides and bees, but about perceived irregularities in the European Commission and European Food Safety Authority’s conduct. After prolonged correspondence throughout the summer, our complaints were finally dismissed by all three bodies; 06/07/2012 by the European Commission, 10/08/2012 by EFSA and by the Ombudsman on 03/10/2012.

Why are other countries banning GMOs[8] [9]as fast as Europe is authorising them?
•On 30/04/2012 the UK Environmental Audit Committee issued recommendation about GMOs.[10] “Unless and until there is both clear public and political acceptance of GM, it is proven to be both beneficial to the environment and to producers, and evidence that demand for these products is based on understanding by consumers and transparent product labelling, the Government should not license its commercial use in the UK nor promote its use overseas. It should establish an independent body to research, evaluate and report on the potential impacts on the environment of GM crops, and their impacts on farming and on the global food system.”
•The British Government rejected the EAC Report:[11] “The Government takes a science-led approach to GM, and the protection of human health and the environment are our overriding priorities… We will only agree to the planting of GM crops, the release of other types of GM organism or the marketing of GM food or feed products if a robust risk assessment that has taken full account of the scientific evidence indicates that it is safe.” In fact, the Government completely rejected the suggestion that an independent body should be formed. It said that research and monitoring in Europe had already established the safety of GMOs.

“The Government does not agree that a new independent body should be established to research, evaluate and report on the potential impacts on the environment of GM crops, and their impacts on farming and on the global food system… In 2010, the European Commission published a report entitled ‘A decade of EU-funded GMO research’ which summarised the results of 50 research projects addressing primarily the safety of GMOs for the environment and for animal and human health.”
•Conflicts of interest in the EU. In a disturbing paper published by the BMJ Publishing Group Ltd the murky web of the EU regulatory boards is exposed.[12] “EFSA experts involved in assessing the risks of GM foods have attracted criticism. In 2010, 12 out of 21 experts on the GMO Panel…had conflicts of interest as defined by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development.”
•The British Government has joined forces with Monsanto, EFSA and the EU Commission to fight civil society in the EU Court to defend the right to import Monsanto’s transgenic soybean Intacta® which produces an insecticide and is resistant to glyphosate herbicides such as Roundup®.[13] Did EFSA’s sudden change of sides from being sued to suing denote the import of hardliners though the revolving doors? Is that why CEO Catherine Geslain-Lanéelle, and Herman Fontier Head of EFSA’s Pesticides Unit have gone?


Why did the US and UK claim that Wikileaks was a danger to National Security, and branded those that leaked the cables as ‘traitors’?

In response to moves by France to ban a Monsanto GM corn 810 variety in late 2007, the US Ambassador to France, Craig Stapleton, a friend and business partner of former US president George Bush, advised Washington to start a military-style trade war against any European Union country which opposed genetically modified (GM) crops.[14] In other newly released cables, US diplomats around the world are found to have pushed GM crops as a strategic government and commercial imperative.[15]

Corporate Espionage: in 2008, Monsanto employed Total Intelligence Solutions to protect the Corporation’s name[16]

In leaked emails, Black wrote that Wilson “understands that we can span collection from internet, to reach out, to boots on the ground on legit basis protecting the Monsanto [brand] name…. Ahead of the curve info and insight/heads up is what he is looking for.” Black added that Total Intelligence “would develop into acting as intel arm of Monsanto.”

Western Governments were looking for chemical weapons in Syria[17]
•What is the difference between chemical weapons and pesticides?
•Not much, they all act as neurotoxins, genotoxins and teratogens.
•Chemical weapons kill fast: the effects are obvious for anyone to see.
•The effect of pesticides on humans and the environment are subtle; genetic and teratogenetic changes in humans often take more time to manifest themselves. By which time the pro-industry lobby is able to propose other causes; climate change, toxoplasmosis in cats, older pesticides (POPs; persistent organic pollutants) etc.
•There is overwhelming evidence that exposure to chemicals in early pregnancy damages the development of the foetus,[18] but agencies in the UK Government are in denial. If pesticides poison insects, what does it do to the human foetal brain when it is the same size as that of an insect brain? That is why there are massively increasing rates of autism and other neurodevelopment disorders. That’s why our children’s brainpower is deteriorating; congenital disabilities and incidents of violent and antisocial behaviour are increasing. Prof Philippe Grandjean published a book in May 2013: ONLY ONE CHANCE. How Environmental Pollution Impairs Brain Development – and How to Protect the Brains of the Next Generation.[19].
•The British Government blames the parents, the teachers, the NHS, the prisons….
•…but this crisis is of the Government’s own making. They totally eliminated the statutory conservation bodies and allowed Agrochemical Corporations free rein. No-one was left to watch the environment. No-one in Defra noticed that ‘the canaries in the cage’ were dying. Even when Buglife described what was happening, Defra completely ignored it. The Government’s policy of supporting a system of agriculture that was chemically-based has meant that chemical contamination of the environment has poisoned people and the environment. The situations in the US and Australia are identical; all three Governments are in the hands of the pesticides industry.
•Pesticides are silent killers: by the time their effects are obvious, it is too late.

Why has no-one in the Medical Research Council or the Sanger Institute worked it out?

It is possible that some of them had done; did they decide that they preferred the status quo?[20]

Former US vice-president Al Gore, in his book An Inconvenient Truth, quoted the American socialist writer Upton Sinclair.[21] “It’s difficult to get a man to understand something if his salary depends upon his not understanding it.” “That is an oversimplification of the complex relationship between consciousness and social context, but it is fundamentally true”.

Of course all those who did work it out may have seen what happens to those who dare to speak the truth.[22] Dr Brian John of GM-Free Cymru wrote: “For more than a decade now, scientists working in the GM field have mounted vicious personal attacks (sometimes politically rather than scientifically motivated) upon serious scientists who have had the temerity to discover “uncomfortable things about GM crops and foods.” This trend started with the vitriolic treatment meted out (with the Royal Society in the vanguard) on Arpad Pusztai and Stanley Ewen a decade ago, and continued with the crucifixion of Ignacio Chapela and David Quist, Angelika Hilbeck, Mae-wan Ho, Judy Carman, Gilles-Eric Séralini, Andrès Carrasco, Manuela Malatesta, Christian Velot, Irina Ermakova and many others. These people have been severely punished by the Agrochemical Corporations, presumably as a warning to others; like farmers hanging dead crows on a line to deter their fellow corvids from eating the crops.

How Roundup Weedkiller Can Promote Cancer, New Study Reveals

Roundup herbicide (glyphosate) is in our air, rain, groundwater, soil and most food in the U.S., and an increasing body of research reveals it has cancer-promoting properties.

Researchers from the Indian Institute of Toxicology Research have recently confirmed the carcinogenic potential of Roundup herbicide using human skin cells (HaCaT ) exposed to extremely low concentrations of the world’s best selling herbicide.

The researchers previously reported on glyphosate’s tumor promoting potential in a two-stage mouse skin carcinogenesis model[i] through its disruption of proteins that regulate calcium (Ca^2+- ) signaling and oxidative stress (SOD 1), but were unable in these investigations to identify the exact molecular mechanisms behind how glyphosate contributes to tumor promotion.

The new study, published in the peer-reviewed journal ISRN Dermatology,[ii] sought out to clarify the exact mode of tumorigenic action, finding the likely mechanism behind glyphosate’s cancer promoting properties is through the downregulation of mitochondrial apoptotic (self-destructive) signaling pathways, as well as through the disruption of a wide range of cell signaling and regulatory components. Cell proliferative effects were induced by concentrations lower than .1 mM, and as low as 0.01 mM, which is four orders of magnitude lower than concentrations commonly used in GM agricultural applications (e.g. 50 mM). The fact that lower concentrations were more effective at inducing proliferation than higher concentrations (which suppressed cell growth), indicates that Roundup is a potent endocrine disrupter, and further highlights why conventional toxicological risk assessments are inadequate because they do not account for the fact that as concentrations are reduced certain types of toxicity — e.g. endocrine disruption — actually increase.

The researchers used the product Roundup Original (glyphosate 41%, polyethoxethyleneamine (POEA) ≅15%—Monsanto Company, St. Louis, MO, USA), and observed the following changes to human skin cells induced through exposure to this chemical mixture:

• Significant increases in cell proliferation (via disruption of CA2+ levels, i.e. decreased levels)
• Increases oxidative stress, as measured by levels of ROS (reactive oxygen species)
• Cell-cycle dysregulation, marked by an accumulation of cells in S-phase (hallmark feature of cancer)
• Increased proliferating cell nuclear antigen (PCNA), a marker for increased cell proliferation
• Increased Bromodeoxyuridin (BrdU), a marker for increased cell proliferation
• Decreases in the level of the protein IP3R1, an indication of resistance to cell death
• Increases in Bcl-2 protein, a tumor promoter gene product
• Decreases in Bax proteins, a tumor suppressor gene product
• Caspase suppression (associated with prevention of cell death)
• Changes in the expression of the Ca2+- binding family of proteins (S100 family) S100A6/S100A9, associated with various cancers.

It is important to emphasize that while the researchers observed cell proliferation-associated changes in the expression of the Ca2+- binding proteins S100A6/A9 following glyphosate exposure to human skin cells, the implications of these findings reach beyond the skin cell lineage. They explained that related modifications of the expression pattern of S100A6/A9 protein have also been found in “hepatocellular carcinoma [15], lung cancer [16], colorectal cancer [17], and melanoma [18].”

The study included a diagram (shown below) representing graphically the multiple ways in which glyphosate disrupts cellular structure/function to contribute to uncontrolled cell proliferation.

The researchers summarized their findings as follows:

In conclusion, in this study, we demonstrated that glyphosate may possibly exert proliferative effect in HaCaT cells by activating Ca2+ binding proteins to promote the imbalance of intracellular Ca2+ homeostasis and lessen SOD1 to increase ROS generation. This effect was partially reversed by treatment with antioxidant NAC indicating connections between oxidative stress and hypocalcaemia. Reduced Ca2+ levels enhance Bcl-2 and decrease Bax, subsequently leading to decrease in cytochrome c to stimulate further decrease of caspase 3 via the downregulation of IP3R1 level, thus halting apoptosis. The present study for the first time provides insight into the mechanism of glyphosate-induced neoplastic potential in mammalian skin system.

It should be noted that their observation that the carcinogenicity of Roundup may be suppressed by the antioxidant n-acetyl-cysteine (NAC), which is a precursor to the cellular detoxifier and antioxidant known as glutathione and a readily available dietary supplement, has important implications, owing to how widespread exposure to Roundup herbicide has become, both through environmental exposures in air, soil, rain and groundwater, as well as in the tens of thousands of unlabeled products containing GM ingredients contaminated with physiologically significant levels of this chemical.

This study adds to a growing body of research demonstrating the carcinogenicity of Roundup herbicide. Only five months ago, the journal Food and Chemical Toxicology published a study indicating that glyphosate is estrogenic and drives breast cancer cell proliferation in the parts-per-trillion range. To view the growing body of research on Roundup’s potential to contribute to cancer initiation or promotion view our toxicology citations here: Roundup Toxicology Research.

Reflecting on the Implications

We leave the reader with some final reflections on the implications of this research. The wholesale dismissal of attempts to differentiate GMO from conventional products through accurate labeling is based on the idea that they are ‘substantially equivalent.’ But, this fallacious approach is based on the mistaken view that the only difference between GMO and non-GMO crops of feed and food importance is the presence of either the novel transgenes inserted into them or their novel transgene protein products.

The discover of Roundup’s extreme toxicity destroys that argument, and calls into question the credibility of any would-be ‘scientist’ or pro-GMO advocate who would propose otherwise.  How so? The fact is that the majority of approved GM plants have been genetically engineered to be “Roundup Ready,” i.e. resistant to glyphosate, which means that the land they are grown upon is basically carpet-bombed with the chemical mixture to kill any living plant other than the glyphosate-resistant GM monocultures. The GM plants take up glyphosate, convert some of it to a similarly toxic metabolite AMPA, and survive the chemical exposure, while maintaining residues of both chemicals post-harvest — which ultimately means that the consumer will be exposed to these compounds through their food.

This means that if you are not consuming foods that are explicitly GM free, you are being exposed to glyphosate (and glyphosate metabolites) on a daily basis. The difference, therefore between GMO and non-GMO is vastly more significant than simply the presence or absence of novel transgenes or their proteins.  It is the difference, candidly, between being exposed (poisoned) with a chemical with likely carcinogenicity or not being exposed to it.  For a more elaborate explanation read: Extreme Toxicity of Roundup Destroys GM/non-GM ‘Substantial Equivalence’ Argument.

Lastly, consider if Roundup (glyphosate) ‘weed-killer’ bore a warning sign ‘may cause cancer,’ or the tens thousands of products made with GM ingredients contaminated with it. Would there be any justifiable reason to resist GMO labeling? No, to the contrary, the focus would be on banning them immediately, instead of cow-towing to the powers that be to allow us the choice not to be poisoned by default.

Despite the so called “science” and “reason” based GMO proponents who think it makes sense to have mattresses labeled, but not food you put into your body, the actual empirical, peer-reviewed and published research – not ghost-written or funded by biotech corporations themselves – says that this omnipresent herbicide has multiple models of carcinogenicity, and in concentration ranges far below agricultural application, as far down as to the parts-per-trillion range. It is time those paying lip service to the ‘evidence-based’ model of GMO risk assessment, and who recklessly promote the dystopian interests of biotech corporations, address the evidence itself, or stop co-opting powerful sounding terms like “Science” to justify their highly irrational and ultimately biased and self-serving perspectives on the subject.

Read the full article here: http://www.greenmedinfo.com/blog/how-roundup-weedkiller-can-promote-cancer-new-study-reveals-1

References

[i] Jasmine George, Sahdeo Prasad, Zafar Mahmood, Yogeshwer Shukla. Studies on glyphosate-induced carcinogenicity in mouse skin: a proteomic approach. J Proteomics. 2010 Mar 10;73(5):951-64. Epub 2010 Jan 4. PMID: 20045496

[ii] Jasmine George, Yogeshwer Shukla. Emptying of Intracellular Calcium Pool and Oxidative Stress Imbalance Are Associated with the Glyphosate-Induced Proliferation in Human Skin Keratinocytes HaCaT Cells.