Tag: monsanto

Journal Retracts ‘Ghost Written’ Monsanto Study Claiming Glyphosate Is Safe

Over the past year massive scandals involving academic research have come under the microscope, after dedicated researchers uncovered rigged studies that made it through peer-review with flying colors, and are now being retracted. 

On Friday, the Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology journal announced that it has retracted a review, safety evaluation, and risk assessment of the herbicide Roundup and its active ingredient, glyphosate, after it emerged that Monsanto was heavily involved in its production. 

“This decision has been made after careful consideration of the COPE guidelines and thorough investigation into the circumstances surrounding the authorship and content of this article and in light of no response having been provided to address the findings,” the journal said in a statement. 

“Litigation in the United States revealed correspondence from Monsanto suggesting that the authors of the article were not solely responsible for writing its content,” and contributions by Monsanto employees were not disclosed, including in the acknowledgements section of the review. 

The journal also said that the authors may have been paid by Monsanto – which was also not disclosed. 

The Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology had been frequently cited in defending glyphosate, an ingredient in Roundup, including citations on Wikipedia, researchers said in a paper published in September. Since 2017, multiple juries have concluded that Roundup exposure has resulted in non-Hodgkin lymphoma in people. Bayer took over legal cases involving the matter after it purchased Monsanto in 2018, including a case that may be adjudicated by the Supreme Court. -Epoch Times

Meanwhile the study’s lead author, Gary Williams – a former pathologist at New York Medical College, is MIA, according to an Epoch Times inquiry. 

An internal email from February 2015 presented as evidence in a 2017 court case revealed that Monsanto employees worked with the authors of the review, with one employee writing that it would be expensive to involve experts from all major areas in a review – and would be cheaper to simply involve certain experts and “we ghost-write” other sections. 

“We would be keeping the cost down by us doing the writing and they would just edit & sign their names so to speak. Recall that is how we handled Williams Kroes & Munro, 2000,” the employee wrote. 

So of course, the journal retracts the dodgy study almost 10 years later – even as other journals – including Critical Reviews in Toxicology, attached expressions of concern co-authored by Williams because they said they authors didn’t disclose the involvement of Monsanto employees and contractors in authoring their research.

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AGENT ORANGE: The “Safe & Effective” Herbicide That’s Giving Veterans Prostate Cancer, Lymphoma, Diabetes, And Much More

My father is a Vietnam Veteran—a real combat veteran unlike the stolen valor Senator from Connecticut, “Da Nang Dick” Blumenthal, who lied about his service on multiple occasions.

My father got drafted into the U.S. Army on April 9th, 1966; he didn’t have a choice.

He completed basic training at Fort Benning in Georgia, before getting sent to Vietnam, where he served in the 2nd Armored Division “Hell on Wheels” for a year. After returning stateside to Fort Hood in Texas, he got sent straight to Detroit as part of the Army’s Civil Disturbance Plan known as Operation Garden Plot. There’s no rest for the wicked, as the saying goes.

When my father landed in Vietnam, he was assigned to man the “open burn pits” in which the military burned absolutely everything: old equipment, chemicals, unexploded ordnance, medical waste, human waste soaked in diesel, plastics, rubber, paint, solvents, and massive amounts of Agent Orange–contaminated material.

Nearly all (90 percent) of Veterans on burn pit duty cited concerns about their exposure.

Yet as of May 2025, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Veterans Health Administration (VHA) has still not specifically researched whether there is any association between Veterans’ health effects and exposure to open-air burning in Vietnam.

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Toxic Fallout: NC Lawmakers Face Fire Over Monsanto ‘Get-Out-Of-Jail-Free’ Provision

In a move that has ignited fierce backlash, North Carolina lawmakers attempted a “gut and stuff.” By inserting a last-minute “de facto immunity provision” into an unrelated House bill, agrochemical giants like Monsanto-Bayer will be given a free pass from accountability for its products linked to cancer and infertility, depending on what happens next. 

A highly controversial policy, Monsanto-Bayer has been seeking state level labeling exemptions amid bankruptcy exploration, as the company faces over 67,000 lawsuits nationwide for its product Round Up.

The revelation, brought to light by molecular toxicologist Dr. Alexandra Muñoz, set off alarm bells among health advocates and concerned citizens alike, who quickly lit-up the phone lines. 

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Georgia Governor Signs Bill Granting Immunity for Harms Caused by Pesticides and Fertilizers

Georgia Governor Brian Kemp signed SB144 into law, which has also been referred to as an immunity bill for agrochemical businesses that sell pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizers. The bill states, “a manufacturer cannot be held liable for failing to warn consumers of health risks above those required by the United States Environmental Protection Agency.” The Georgia legislature passed the bill and was awaiting Kemp’s signature, which he finalized on Monday.

Georgia became the second state in the nation to provide manufacturer immunity for harm caused by pesticides after North Dakota signed a similar bill into law last month. Bayer has been handling tens of thousands of lawsuits related to cancer allegedly caused by Roundup, a product that Bayer owns after the agrochemical corporation purchased Monsanto in 2018. In April, The HighWire reported about Bayer’s recent court loss in which the company is required to pay over $2 billion for causing a man’s non-Hodgkin lymphoma, but the high payout amount is expected to be appealed. This case was conducted in a Georgia courtroom.

The EPA is still awaiting a court decision regarding its most recent evaluation of glyphosate’s effect on human health. The EPA currently states, “No risks of concern to human health from current uses of glyphosate.” The EPA website also states, “No evidence that glyphosate causes cancer in humans.”

Meanwhile, the passage of SB144 in Georgia means a farmer cannot sue Bayer for harms allegedly caused by Roundup because the product contains the label required by the EPA. The label states, “Keep Out of Reach of Children CAUTION See [back/ side] [panel/ booklet/ label] for [additional] first aid and precautionary statements. Alternative Text: [See container label for [complete] use directions, first aid and precautionary statements.]”

Bayer issued a statement applauding the Governor for signing the legislation. The statement said, “The signing of SB 144 by Governor Kemp demonstrates that Georgia stands with its farmers, who work tirelessly to produce safe and affordable food for communities throughout the state. We thank Governor Kemp and the legislators, farmers and ag groups that supported this important piece of legislation.”

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Women Exposed to Glyphosate at Higher Risk of Infertility

Glyphosate, the world’s most widely used herbicide, disrupts female hormones and damages the ovaries and uterus in ways that can make it more difficult for women to get pregnant, according to a new review of human and animal research.

The study, published in Reproductive Sciences on March 21, also found that glyphosate may be tied to polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) and endometriosis, due to its endocrine-disrupting capabilities and reproductive toxicity.

PCOS is a hormonal disorder that affects the ovaries, fertility and periods, among other symptoms. Endometriosis is an often painful condition when tissue similar to the uterine lining (endometrial tissue) grows outside the uterus. Both conditions are among the leading causes of infertility.

“Collectively, these findings raise concerns about potential associations between [glyphosate-based herbicide] exposure and female reproductive system diseases, including PCOS, endometriosis, and subfertility/infertility,” the researchers say.

The study highlights growing concerns about the long-term health effects of glyphosate and glyphosate-based herbicides (GBH), such as Roundup. Glyphosate use rose sharply in recent decades, with around 240 million pounds sprayed annually on U.S. farms.

People are exposed to glyphosate through skin contact, ingestion in food or water and inhalation of airborne particles. Studies have detected glyphosate and its breakdown product (aminomethylphosphonic acid, or AMPA) in blood, breast milk and urine.

A 2022 survey found glyphosate in more than 80% of urine samples from U.S. adults and children.

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Glyphosate Present in 57% of Sperm Samples From Infertile Men

Infertility is now a worldwide crisis. The World Health Organization estimates that 1 in 6 people today are having difficulty conceiving. Although female infertility is usually given more attention, infertility among men is also being more closely scrutinized.

Research notes that male infertility accounts for 30% of infertility cases, and while the root causes of this condition could be multifaceted, there’s no doubt that environmental factors, particularly the chemicals you’re exposed to every day, play a crucial role.

A recent study confirms this, putting into the spotlight one of the most ubiquitous and devastating manmade chemicals today — glyphosate.

A group of French researchers sought to determine the link between glyphosate and male infertility.

After analyzing samples from males who visited a local infertility clinic, they found that 73 out of 128 (around 57%) participants had detectable levels of glyphosate in their blood and semen.

Published in the June issue of Ecotoxicology and Environmental Safety journal, the study noted that although glyphosate levels are higher in semen samples, there’s a positive correlation between plasma blood and seminal glyphosate content.

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Congress Must Reject Monsanto-Bayer Plan to Avoid Liability for Poisoning Humans, Environment

Millions of American users of glyphosate-based Roundup have likely assumed the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) would never have approved the pesticide unless it was safe.

But the science-based truth has never been as cut and dried as the EPA and Bayer, which bought Roundup maker Monsanto in 2018, have made it sound.

In a series of trials across the country, juries — and the public –— have learned that despite the safety claims by Bayer and the EPA, hundreds of studies by independent scientists link glyphosate herbicides to serious health harms, including cancer.

Even though Bayer maintains that its glyphosate products are safe and not carcinogenic, the company has thus far agreed to pay out more than $10 billion in settlement costs to tens of thousands of glyphosate users suffering from non-Hodgkin lymphoma and thousands of lawsuits remain.

In an effort to block further litigation, the chemical giant has turned its focus to getting federal and state legislation passed to block Roundup users from suing the company for damages.

According to a recent Washington Post article, Bayer helped draft language for a legislative measure that would limit the types of lawsuits brought by Roundup users.

That measure is included in the U.S. House of Representatives version of the 2024 Farm Bill, which is slated to be finalized later this year. The company has also been pushing lawmakers in several states to pass similar measures.

Key to Bayer’s messaging to legislators is that, because glyphosate is EPA-approved, research showing its harms should be rejected. But the process by which the EPA approved glyphosate decades ago has never been reassuring to independent scientists such as myself.

EPA scientists conducting initial assessments of glyphosate in the 1980s discovered several mice dosed with the pesticide developed rare kidney tumors, prompting the scientists to confirm the pesticide’s link to cancer.

Then the EPA’s pesticides office did what it often does: It ignored the troubling research and the recommendation of its own scientists and approved the pesticide without acknowledging its documented link to cancer.

Even the EPA’s subsequent assessments and reapprovals of the pesticide, required every 15 years, have been plagued by questionable science. In 2022 a federal appeals court ruled that the agency’s finding that glyphosate has no link to cancer violated its own cancer guidelines and “was not supported by substantial evidence.”

Now it’s these problematic EPA endorsements that Bayer insists should be the basis for putting limits on the lawsuits glyphosate users can file.

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Genetically Modified Soil Microbes May Have ‘Irreversible Consequences’

A plan by major agrochemical companies to develop genetically engineered (GE) soil microbes, including bacteria and fungi, to act as pesticides and fertilizers is raising concerns about the unknown and potentially disastrous risks associated with the new organisms, according to a report published Tuesday by Friends of the Earth.

Bayer-Monsanto, Syngenta and BASF are among the chemical giants known to be developing the microbes which, according to the report, are fundamentally different from the already controversial genetically modified organisms (GMOs) that have existed for decades.

GE microbes are living organisms that share their genetic material easily with other species and travel vast distances in the wind. And because they are microscopic, their numbers are vast.

“An application of GE bacteria could release approximately 3 trillion genetically modified organisms every half an acre — that’s about how many GE corn plants there are in the entire U.S.,” said Dana Perls, food and technology manager at Friends of the Earth, in a press release.

Introducing GE microbes into agriculture represents an “unprecedented open air genetic experiment,” the report says. “The scale of release is far larger, and the odds of containment are far smaller than for other GE crops.”

Scientists understand the role and function of less than 1 percent of the billions of existing species of microbes or “biologicals.”

Yet the race is on by biotech and agrochemical companies to develop, modify and patent new microbes to capture a share of the biologicals market, which is set to triple in value to $29.31 billion by 2029.

At least two GE microbes, Pivot Bio’s Proven and BASF’s Poncho Votivo seed treatments, are already being used by U.S. farmers on millions of acres of farmland.

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New U.S. Government Research is Finally Admitting that Glyphosate Weed Killer Causes Cancer

If you have already had something to eat today prior to reading this article, chances are very high that you have already ingested glyphosate, the active ingredient in herbicides such as RoundUp, the most widely used agrochemical in the world.

Since I have earned my living for the past two decades by selling clean food, I have been warning the public now for many years about the dangers of these agrochemicals and the contamination of our nation’s commercial food supply.

If you do a search on “glyphosate” at Health Impact News, you will get search result list of over 380 articles that we have published during the past decade.

The advent of genetically modified (GMO) seeds in the late 1990s, particularly corn and soybeans, has allowed the agricultural chemical giants, such as Monsanto, to spray greater quantities of herbicides and pesticides onto the nation’s crops.

In 2014 we began testing commercial grain products to verify that North America’s wheat and grain supply was contaminated by the herbicide glyphosate, even though there are currently no GMO varieties of wheat or other grains.

We found it to be true, due to the practice of “desiccating” crops in the fall with glyphosate in the northern states and Canada to allow the farmers to harvest their wheat before the first snowfall.

Next, we tested our own USDA certified organic grains that we sold in our online store, and were shocked to find out that they were just as contaminated with glyphosate as non-organic grains. 

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