The biotechnology giant Bayer – Monsanto has lobbied in the House and in various US States over the last year to obtain legal protection against billion-dollar class actions relating to non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and cancers caused by glyphosate. (1)
1) Exposure to glyphosate and serious public health risks
IARC (International Agency for Research on Cancer), in 2015, classified glyphosate in group 2A as a ‘possible carcinogen for humans’. (2)
Numerous scientific studies published in ‘peer review’ have shown correlations between exposure to glyphosate and serious public health risks, with regard to:
– various types of tumors, non-Hodgkin lymphoma (3)
– endocrine interference (4,5)
– gluten intolerance and celiac disease (6)
– antibiotic resistance (7). Beyond
– possible genotoxicity (8) e
– developmental neurotoxicity, autism (9,10,11).
2) Monsanto – Bayer, scientific fraud and class actions
The glyphosate was patented in the USA and marketed by Monsanto in 1974, two years after the ban on DDT by the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) and has effectively become its successor. Corruption and scientific fraud have characterized the studies used to obtain authorizations for the use of the world’s best-selling agrotoxicant from the beginning (10,11,12).
Class actions in the USA, combination, literally exploded immediately after the German giant Bayer purchased Monsanto in 2018, for US$ 63 billion. And not even the allocation of US$ 16 billion (equal to almost 1/3 of the annual turnover) in 2021 was enough to close Pandora’s box where 170.000 legal proceedings are still pending (13,14).
3) Bayer, lobby to stem class actions in the USA
Bill Anderson, CEO of Bayer AG, complains that the costs of class actions in the USA threaten his very existence, as well as having exceeded investments in research and development. (15) The German giant threatens the loss of jobs, unless it continues to sell glyphosate undisturbed, in the USA as in the EU and elsewhere, to professional and non-professional users.
Bayer has instead developed a different strategy to combat class actions: bypassing the judicial power to rely on the legislative one. His lobby thus obtained the inclusion of a specific clause in the Farm Bill reform project being discussed in the House, which would prevent further legal action against him. Similar bills have been advanced in Idaho, Iowa and Missouri.
4) Profit over People
The profits of corporations always remain at the forefront of the interests of politicians who betray their mandate every day, in the USA as in its EU colony where the ten-year renewal of glyphosate occurred a few months ago, in defiance of the precautionary principle and the reports of scientific fraud throughout ignored today. (16)
The choice of all of us of purchasing organic, local and seasonal food – if possible, directly from farmers and breeders – today remains the only tool available to stem the poisoning of populations and the environment. And in the future, perhaps, vote for who can really represent the public good.
#Égalité #PaceTerraDignità
Dario Dongo
Footnotes
(1) Tony Romm. Bayer lobbies Congress to help fight lawsuits tying Roundup to cancer. The Washington Post. 20.6.24 https://tinyurl.com/eykdpcrb
(2) IARC. Q&A on glyphosate. March 2016 https://tinyurl.com/2676vvcn
(3) Shannon L. Fitzgerald. Glyphosate: Health Concerns and Safer Alternatives. Drugwatch. 27.6.24 https://tinyurl.com/yfjskas7
(4) Dario Dongo, Andrea Adelmo Della Penna. Glyphosate, endocrine disruption and tumors. New evidence. GIFT (Great Italian Food Trade).
(5) Marta Strinati. Glyphosate ‘male’ females. The scientific study of newborns. GIFT (Great Italian Food Trade).
(6) Marta Strinati. Glyphosate and gluten intolerance, possible correlations. GIFT (Great Italian Food Trade).
(7) Marta Strinati. Glyphosate and gluten intolerance, possible correlations. GIFT (Great Italian Food Trade).
(8) Marta Strinati. Glyphosate and genotoxicity, the ANSES study ‘declassified’. GIFT (Great Italian Food Trade).
(9) Dario Dongo. Glyphosate and neurotoxicity, doubts and questions from a toxicologist. GIFT (Great Italian Food Trade).
(10) Dario Dongo. How the agrochemical industry hides the toxicity of pesticides. New studies. GIFT (Great Italian Food Trade).
(11) Dario Dongo. Glyphosate, civil society denounces fraud in view of the ten-year renewal in the EU. GIFT (Great Italian Food Trade).
(12) Evaggelos Vallianatos. Ruthless Power and Deleterious Politics: From DDT to Roundup. Independent Science News. 17.7.15 https://tinyurl.com/2y3mcw6p
(13) Dario Dongo. Glyphosate, Bayer allocates 16 billion dollars but the sentences are upheld on appeal. GIFT (Great Italian Food Trade). 11.8.21
(14) Managing the Roundup™ Litigation. Bayer https://tinyurl.com/mr55bpjc
(15) Kim Chipman, Tarsus Velosus. Bayer Fights for Survival as Roundup Lawsuits Burn Cash. Bloomberg. 24.5.24 https://tinyurl.com/2t3y3tph
(16) Dario Dongo. No to reducing pesticides, yes to glyphosate. ToxicEurope. GIFT (Great Italian Food Trade).
Dario Dongo, lawyer and journalist, PhD in international food law, founder of WIISE (FARE - GIFT - Food Times) and Égalité.
