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Weedkiller ingredient tied to cancer found in 80% of US urine samples

theguardian.com

251–260 of 379 posts

Re: Weedkiller ingredient tied to cancer found in 80% of US urine samples

#251
post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People who have been exposed to got cancer, but that is meaningless in showing causation. Internal documents show concern, but show no evidence that it causes cancer, or that Monsanto had internal data showing it caused cancer.

This type of rhetoric isn’t helpful, except to companies and manufacturers looking to minimize the attention around specific products with known carcinogenic properties.

This type of rhetoric isn’t helpful, except to people who wish to replace basic critical thinking and healthy skepticism with vacuous opinionated polemics on evil corporations and their general evilness.

Re: Weedkiller ingredient tied to cancer found in 80% of US urine samples

#252

Society loves to make fun of those who choose organic produce, but avoiding glysophate is the main reason I do so, and it works: > Organic diet intervention significantly reduces urinary glyphosate levels in U.S. children and adults > https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S001393512...

But what does it do to the levels of organic pesticides?

This is a valid point; just because something is naturally-derived, doesn't make it safe. For example, permethrin is approved for organic use but it's also a neurotoxin: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5598406/

Obviously the dosages are low in foods treated with it, but you're still ingesting a neurotoxin, yet the food can be legally labelled organic.

My solution is to list the pesticides on the packaging like they do the nutritional content.

Additional info here: https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/science-sushi/httpblogs...

Re: Weedkiller ingredient tied to cancer found in 80% of US urine samples

#253
post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

meat is a known carcinogenic in itself. EDIT: spare the stupid downvotes. Here: https://www.who.int/news-room/questions-and-answers/item/can...

Hot water is a known carcinogenic. https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanonc/article/PIIS1470-2... It's there, in the statistics. The thing is, the risks of eating meat or drinking hot espressos are like national lottery kind of probabilities. Not like asbestos or carbon particles, wich have more like rock paper scissor kind of probabilities.

You are trying to make a strawman by phrasing it as an exaggerated risk.

You can instead go check the probabilities or read scientific documentation and you'll find that both fluid intake at very high temperature and meat consumption have been reported as significant carcinogenics in many papers on publications with high impact factors.

You can search on Scholar or ask your GP. No need to be dishonest on HN.

Re: Weedkiller ingredient tied to cancer found in 80% of US urine samples

#254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>We must scientifically prove the thing is safe to use, not have to prove it is unsafe to be removed. Wait... so every restaurant has to show scientific proof that each of their ingredients are safe to use? I'm pretty sure that is an impossible standard to meet.

You're overthinking this a little. If Monsanto comes up with a new weedkiller, they have to prove that its safe for humans before its put into use. It has nothing to do with restaurants. Obviously stuff would be grandfathered in as well. But its a fantastic idea going forward.

If you require farmers to use "approved" processes for farming, but you don't require grocery stores and restaurants to use those farmers, then they will simply buy food from farmers that don't follow those principles.

Re: Weedkiller ingredient tied to cancer found in 80% of US urine samples

#255

Not knowing anything about glyphosate, I went to the article before reading the comments. I’ll just put this here because it was clear the researchers wanted to be sure people see it. From the first paragraph of the article—> > In 2015, the International Agency for Research on Cancer determined that glyphosate is a “probable human carcinogen” (IARC, 2015). However, the European Food Safety Authority and the Joint Foo…

> the European Food Safety Authority determined that glyphosate is unlikely to be a carcinogen Yet Europe has banned glyphosate (it is allowed in the US). Curious

Just to play devil’s advocate for a second: the fact that the EU has banned glyphosate does not mean that it’s a confirmed carcinogen. It only means that it’s considered harmful, which it can be in many other ways apart from causing cancer.

Re: Weedkiller ingredient tied to cancer found in 80% of US urine samples

#256
post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reply to which you replied is flagged and killed. It was not a very hot reply. It did not break the "guidelines". Well worded and informative actually. This is telling.

It insinuated that there are a number of users on this website that are being paid by Monsanto. That is absolutely against site guidelines.

No, the rules forbid explicit accusation. Not vague insinuation.

A rule forbidding vague insinuation would be too broad and open to abuse.

That said, Monsanto would certainly deploy a flock of shills to HN, reddit, twitter, facebook, etc. The existence of motive, means and opportunity is clear. Therefore they have definitely done that.

Are we going to ignore that fact?

Re: Weedkiller ingredient tied to cancer found in 80% of US urine samples

#257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People who have been exposed to the chemical got cancer. Internal Monsanto documents show the link and their concern. A man got a court to rule in his favour for 289 million dollars, after the jury saw this evidence: https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/aug/10/monsanto-tr...

People who have been exposed to got cancer, but that is meaningless in showing causation. Internal documents show concern, but show no evidence that it causes cancer, or that Monsanto had internal data showing it caused cancer.

username checks out ;)

Re: Weedkiller ingredient tied to cancer found in 80% of US urine samples

#258
"said it was “obviously concerning” that a large percentage of the US population is exposed to glyphosate, but said it is still unclear how that translates to human health"

That last line pretty much sums up the article. Lots more questions than answers.

Re: Weedkiller ingredient tied to cancer found in 80% of US urine samples

#259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow that's incredibly depressing. Yeah glyphosate kills weeds by inducing unsustainable growth and forcing the plant to overextend itself and die as a result. So it makes sense that if you apply it to a crop you're going to harvest anyway you'll get a bit more yield out of it. I guess tech+ban is the only way to go, unless we're okay forcing ourselves to play the cancer lottery with worse odds.

2,4-D is the widely used growth accelerator. Glyphosate blocks the action of an enzyme that is necessary for plants to grow. Crops are frequently sprayed with desiccants to speed harvest once they are mature. Glyphosate is used that way.

I got them mixed up, thanks for the correction.

Re: Weedkiller ingredient tied to cancer found in 80% of US urine samples

#260
post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There’s no question it would be better if it were true but how sure can we be that it’s not just the same food with different labels?

Because the FDA exists?? Because that would be fraud to claim otherwise, and fruit/veg sources are easily traceable back to their source, particularly at quantity?

USDA regulates that, at least for products with its seal.

https://www.ams.usda.gov/rules-regulations/organic/organic-s...

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