Time to Ban Glyphosates

Dr. Weeks’ Comment: Glyphosates (think Round-up) are highly toxic and the only safe level is …… zero. Yet it saturates your food – even the organic food! And the food of your kids and grandkids. Read one of the many testimonials by doctors and scientists yesterday in California where the effort is underway to BAN glyphosates.

Recap of yesterday’s Prop 65 glyphosate hearing in CA

Posted by Laura Hayes yesterday at 8:55am

40+ people testified yesterday (6-7-17) that there is NO SAFE LEVEL OF GLYPHOSATE, while 5 people (3 Monsanto-related, 1 from CA Big Ag, and 1 from CA Farm Bureau) sang the praises and safety of glyphosate. The Monsanto people argued that the “safe” level is “infinite”. Yeah, let’s see how willing they are to drink a jug of Round Up…a sort of inverse of “put your money where your mouth is”…a “put your mouth where your money is!”

Excellent testimony was presented to OEHHA as to why zero is the only “safe” level of glyphosate, meaning, it needs to be banned.

Below is the brief testimony I gave (and a friend’s is below mine…hoping Zen will post hers here, too). Josh Coleman videotaped the entire hearing, so stay tuned for one of his fabulous YouTube links soon!

Public Comment to OEHHA on 6-7-17

There Is No ”˜Safe’ Level of Glyphosate – Please Protect Californians and Our Natural Resources from Glyphosate

Submitted by:

Laura Hayes

Members of OEHHA, you have before you a critically-important decision to make. Do you permit the use of glyphosate, which is now pervasive in the soil in which our food is grown, the water which we drink, the meats and foods which we eat, and the air that we breathe…do you permit this toxic chemical’s use at the random rate of 1100 mcg per day per person…with no accurate way to monitor or enforce such a rate…and with no accounting for a person’s age, weight, health status, types of exposures, or present load of toxins? Or…do you permit the use of glyphosate at a lower, but still random rate, which also cannot be accurately monitored or enforced…and again, without personal factors taken into account? Or, do you act on the growing body of evidence that shows that there is no safe level of glyphosate, and declare that its use will no longer be permitted in the state of CA?

At this point in time, we know that glyphosate is both tumorigenic and carcinogenic, meaning that it causes both tumors and cancer. We know that it causes cancer cells to proliferate, whether it was the original cause of those cells or not. We know that glyphosate is a neurotoxin, meaning that it damages the brain. We know that is an endocrine system disruptor, meaning that it adversely affects hormones causing developmental, reproductive, neurological, and immunological problems.

We know that glyphosate can substitute for glycine during protein synthesis. I have attached a list from Dr. Stephanie Seneff of MIT which explains the many negative health consequences that result when glyphosate substitutes for glycine during protein synthesis. She considers one of the most serious consequences to be the disruption of digestive enzymes, which can result in autoimmune disease.

”¨To break things down to a very practical level, here are a few questions to consider:

1. If I asked you which apple you wanted to eat, or feed to your child or grandchild, would you choose the one sprayed with poison, i.e. with glyphosate, or the one not sprayed with poison, the clean and untainted one?

2. If I asked you which glass of water you wanted to drink, or give to your child or grandchild, would you choose the one in which glyphosate run-off was present, or the one without a known carcinogen and known neurotoxin included?

3. If I asked you which plate of food you wanted to eat, or give to your daughter or granddaughter who was breastfeeding her newborn, would you choose the plate of food on which the meat, potatoes, vegetables, and roll were all heavily laced with the skull-and-crossbones-labeled glyphosate, whose Monsanto testers wear Hazmat suits when field testing it, or would you choose the plate of food cleanly raised which was grown with no known health hazards?

4. Final question, how will you answer your spouse, children, and grandchildren who receive a cancer diagnosis, who struggle with infertility, who suffer from thyroid problems, who are brain damaged in some way, or who succumb to any of the myriad health and development issues now plaguing our population in never-seen-before numbers, when they ask you if you ever permitted anything known to be carcinogenic, neurotoxic, or hormone and endocrine disrupting during your tenure at OEHHA?

Each of you knows what the right thing to do is. The question is, will you choose to do it?

The public comment below is from my friend and colleague and is shared with permission. To submit your own, choose one of the following options, and submit by 5:00pm on June 21st:

1. CA OEHHA Online Comments

2. Email CA OEHHA: Esther Barajas-Ochoa at esther.barajas-ochoa@oehha.ca.gov

Include In Subject Line: “GLYPHOSATE NSRL”

Public Comment:

Proposed Proposition 65 : “No Significant Risk Level” (NSRL) for Glyphosate Hearing

June 7, 2017

CA EPA, OEHHA

Sacramento, CA

Good afternoon. I am a mother, a grandmother, a longtime credentialed teacher, and an advocate and activist for people with developmental disabilities – many of whom have been tragically impacted by environmental toxins (including pesticides). I am not a scientist, but I am extremely passionate about researching and understanding what is happening to the health and well-being of children as a result of increased exposure to environmental toxins.

Many thanks to OEHHA and to all who have been involved with adding glyphosate to the CA State Proposition 65 Toxics List. When an NSRL (No Significant Risk Level) for glyphosate is established, that level must be zero. Exposure to glyphosate is not in isolation; it acts synergistically and cumulatively affecting different individuals very differently, and unpredictably, based on age, weight, genetic predisposition, previous toxic exposures, existing health conditions — many, many factors. It is preposterous to say that there is any level of glyphosate exposure without significant risk for a newborn baby, for example. What is the risk level for someone who already suffers myriad health problems from severe toxic exposures? We simply do not know the risk levels for any one person at any given time in their lives. We are learning more and more about the devastating toll that glyphosate exposure takes on health, and it is beyond appalling. The NSRL for glyphosate must be zero.

For many years, I was a classroom teacher for children of migrant farm workers in Central California. Those children and their families intimately knew about the risks of glyphosate exposure – even though they were told that their exposure to glyphosate was perfectly safe. They knew enough not to eat, nor to let me eat, the crops that came from the fields in which they worked — fields that were heavily sprayed with RoundUp. The parents told me stories about frequent miscarriages, about skin and eye lesions, about respiratory problems and vomiting, and about cancers that resulted from working in the fields. They knew first-hand the cause of their health problems.

A recent UCLA study (summary attached) found that the advanced thyroid cancer rate in some California counties is well above the national average. The research suggested that there was an environmental component in explaining why the incidence of advanced-stage thyroid cancer is much higher in California than the national average. Dr. Avital Harari, a member of the UCLA Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center said, “California has the largest amount of farmland in the country, so this type of exposure could very well contribute to our cancer rates.” The research continues in investigating the links between thyroid cancer and exposure to pesticides.

People deserve to know the risks associated with glyphosate exposure – whether they are working in agriculture, shopping at the grocery store, feeding a pet, or playing on a sports field. They deserve to know that there is no guaranteed safe amount of exposure. We all come with different accumulated toxic loads with differing synergies, different health profiles, different genetic make-ups, different ages. There is no safe allowable daily exposure to glyphosate for any of us. The NSRL for glyphosate must be zero.

Thank you.

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