Weed killer found in human urine across Europe

Weed killer found in human urine across Europe

www.foeeurope.org

People in 18 countries across Europe have been found to have traces of the weed killer glyphosate in their urine, show the results of tests commissioned by Friends of the Earth Europe and released today [1].

The findings raise concerns about increasing levels of exposure to glyphosate-based weed killers, commonly used by farmers, public authorities and gardeners across Europe. The use of glyphosate is predicted to rise further if more genetically modified (GM) crops are grown in Europe [2].

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Related AboveTopSecret.com Discussion Threads:
Monsanto: Unsafe Levels of Glyphosate(RoundUp) Found in the Urine of City Dwellers

So why is glyphosate, the active ingredient in Monsanto's Roundup, being found in the urine of these Europeans, who supposedly live in a place free of transgenic GMOs?

A 2000 review concluded that "under present and expected conditions of new use, there is no potential for Roundup herbicide to pose a health risk to humans".[63] A 2002 review by the European Union reached the same conclusion.[64] Glyphosate causes oxidative damage to human skin cells. Antioxidants such as vitamins C and E were found by one study to provide some protection against such damage, leading the authors to recommend that these chemicals be added to glyphosate formulations.[65] Severe skin burns are very rare.[47]

Despite the ongoing debate on whether or not glyphosate is safe for consumption, the question remains -- how are these tested Europeans ingesting glyphosate? Where did their food come from in a place supposedly free of GMO use? (Organic farmers would not use glyphosate on their crops)

If there is a presence in the humans in Europe, and GMO food production is supposedly banned, I wonder how much glyphosate passes through humans in countries where GMO food production is allowed and glyphosate (among many other chemicals) are constantly being doused on food crops.

I suppose the science may find out in time, after the damage is done. Anyone remember thalidomide?

www.foeeurope.org
(visit the link for the full news article)

Originally posted by Philippines
So why is glyphosate, the active ingredient in Monsanto's Roundup, being found in the urine of these Europeans, who supposedly live in a place free of transgenic GMOs?

Didnt you do any reading at all about the topic before you created this thread?
Even a simple glance at the wikipedia page would have answered many of them.

1. Monsanto (boo!, hiss!) hasnt had the patent rights to it since 2000.
A #eload of different companies make glyphosate products.

Glyphosate is marketed ... worldwide by many agrochemical companies in different solution strengths under many tradenames: Accord, Aquaneat, Aquamaster, Bronco, Buccaneer, Campain, Clearout 41 Plus, Clear-up, Expedite, Fallow Master, Genesis Extra I, Glyfos Induce, Glypro, GlyStar Induce, GlyphoMax Induce, Honcho, JuryR, Landmaster, MirageR, Pondmaster, Protocol, Prosecutor, Ranger, Rascal, Rattler, Razor Pro, Rodeo, Roundup, I, Roundup Pro Concentrate, Roundup UltraMax, Roundup WeatherMax, Silhouette, Touchdown IQ.[29][30][31][32]
Manufacturers include Bayer, Dow AgroSciences, Du Pont, Cenex/Land O’Lakes, Helena, Monsanto, Platte, Riverside/Terra, and Zeneca.

2. Glyphosate is used for many more purposes than GMO (boo!, hiss!) crops.

But hey, never let the facts get in the way of a good GMO/Monsanto bashing story. Its what ATS users thrive on.

glyphosphate in the urine?
i wonder what that stuff turns into when mixed with other things...like fire retardent, estrogen mimicers,....
or horse meat

and no wonder when we hang a leak out back to ease the load on the septic it kills the junipers

Thanks for the thread, interesting stuff.

I looked at the study and found some interesting things. First, it was commissioned (and I assume paid for) by Friends of the Earth - Europe. If it had been commissioned by Monsanto, I know ATSers would reject it as biased. So maybe this one is, too?

Second, look at the purpose of the study:

The goal of this study was to support the biomonitoring work of the BUND / FoE against the background of increasing Glyphosate use in some European countries.

Maybe I'm misunderstanding, but that doesn't seem very objective at first glance.

Third, what did they actually find?

All in all 12 (6.6%) participants of the study significantly exceeded the tentative reference value of 0.8 ìg/L for
Glyphosate

That doesn't seem to be many. But what is this "tentative" reference value?

The reference values for Glyphosate and AMPA are only tentative. They were derived from an urban collective (n=90) and are defined as the 95. percentile of the measured values. They were established by Medical Laboratory Bremen in 2012 during the process of the method validation. Strictly speaking they are only valid to the region of Bremen.

So the reference value is only valid for a portion of Germany, but it is being used as the value for 18 countries in Europe?

I'm sorry, but this test is not impressive at all. I give it no credibility.

Originally posted by alfa1

Originally posted by Philippines
So why is glyphosate, the active ingredient in Monsanto's Roundup, being found in the urine of these Europeans, who supposedly live in a place free of transgenic GMOs?

Didnt you do any reading at all about the topic before you created this thread?
Even a simple glance at the wikipedia page would have answered many of them.

1. Monsanto (boo!, hiss!) hasnt had the patent rights to it since 2000.
A #eload of different companies make glyphosate products.

Glyphosate is marketed ... worldwide by many agrochemical companies in different solution strengths under many tradenames: Accord, Aquaneat, Aquamaster, Bronco, Buccaneer, Campain, Clearout 41 Plus, Clear-up, Expedite, Fallow Master, Genesis Extra I, Glyfos Induce, Glypro, GlyStar Induce, GlyphoMax Induce, Honcho, JuryR, Landmaster, MirageR, Pondmaster, Protocol, Prosecutor, Ranger, Rascal, Rattler, Razor Pro, Rodeo, Roundup, I, Roundup Pro Concentrate, Roundup UltraMax, Roundup WeatherMax, Silhouette, Touchdown IQ.[29][30][31][32]
Manufacturers include Bayer, Dow AgroSciences, Du Pont, Cenex/Land O’Lakes, Helena, Monsanto, Platte, Riverside/Terra, and Zeneca.

2. Glyphosate is used for many more purposes than GMO (boo!, hiss!) crops.

But hey, never let the facts get in the way of a good GMO/Monsanto bashing story. Its what ATS users thrive on.

edit on 16-6-2013 by alfa1 because: (no reason given)

1. Yes, thanks for the list of other branded names of glyphosate. I should have just left monsanto out of it, even though one of their chemists invented the stuff in 1970.

2. Of course it is used for many more purposes than just transgenic GMO crops, the question here is, how is it in the urine of Europeans that tested positive for it? Why would a farmer spray glyphosate on crops you want to eat, when they are not resistant to glyphosate?

What are your theories on how they're ingesting it?

Originally posted by charles1952
Thanks for the thread, interesting stuff.

I looked at the study and found some interesting things. First, it was commissioned (and I assume paid for) by Friends of the Earth - Europe. If it had been commissioned by Monsanto, I know ATSers would reject it as biased. So maybe this one is, too?

Second, look at the purpose of the study:

The goal of this study was to support the biomonitoring work of the BUND / FoE against the background of increasing Glyphosate use in some European countries.

Maybe I'm misunderstanding, but that doesn't seem very objective at first glance.

Third, what did they actually find?

All in all 12 (6.6%) participants of the study significantly exceeded the tentative reference value of 0.8 ìg/L for
Glyphosate

That doesn't seem to be many. But what is this "tentative" reference value?

The reference values for Glyphosate and AMPA are only tentative. They were derived from an urban collective (n=90) and are defined as the 95. percentile of the measured values. They were established by Medical Laboratory Bremen in 2012 during the process of the method validation. Strictly speaking they are only valid to the region of Bremen.

So the reference value is only valid for a portion of Germany, but it is being used as the value for 18 countries in Europe?

I'm sorry, but this test is not impressive at all. I give it no credibility.

You make some great points, but does that mean glyphosate is not present in their urine?

If you think it is there, is it something natural or are they ingesting it somehow?

reply to post by Philippines

Dear Philippines,

Great questions, and I agree with you. The stuff is in their urine, and my best guess is they got it through eating it. It's not quickly absorbed by the skin, but I suppose it could have been inhaled.

I found an interesting fact sheet in .pdf format. It's fron the National Pesticide Information Center. (whatever that is)
npic.orst.edu/factsheets/glyphotech.pdf

Here is some of it, sorry if it's boring.

Animals
•• Researchers gave beagle dogs capsules containing 0, 20,100, or 500 mg/kg/day of glyphosate for one year. No effects were observed; the No Observed Effect Level (NOEL) for systemic toxicity is greater than or equal to 500 mg/kg/day.

And I like beagles. Poor dogs.

Researchers collected urine samples over 8 months from workers at •• two forestry nurseries where glyphosate was used for weed control. No glyphosate was detected in any of the 355 urine samples. The researchers attributed the lack of detected glyphosate in worker urine samples to the poor absorption of glyphosate through the skin.
•• Five forestry workers sprayed glyphosate for 6 hours a day over the course of a week. No statistically significant differences were found in medical examinations and laboratory testing performed on the workers following pesticide application.
•• Researchers collected urine samples from farm families in South Carolina and Minnesota as part of the Farm Family Exposure Study. On the day of application, 60% of farmers had a detectable level of glyphosate in their urine of at least 1 ppb. The geometric mean of glyphosate detected was 3 ppb, with a maximum value of 233 ppb. Mean urinary concentrations of glyphosate were higher in farmers who did not use rubber gloves during application.

That means one poor sap had a urine level of 233,000 parts per trillion. I'm surprised he didn't die on the spot.

Metabolism
•• Glyphosate undergoes little metabolism and is excreted mostly unchanged in the feces and secondarily in the urine.
•• Samples taken from goats and hens fed glyphosate contained the parent compound and AMPA, but there was no evidence of other glyphosate metabolites in body tissues, eggs, or milk.
•• High ratios of glyphosate to AMPA were detected in a human patient’s blood serum 8 hrs (22.6 ìg/ml glyphosate to 0.18 ìg/ml AMPA) and 16 hrs (4.4 ìg/ml glyphosate to 0.03 ìg/ml AMPA) post-ingestion, as well as in the patient’s total amount of urine. This indicates that glyphosate metabolism was minimal.

It seems that if they're going to find the stuff anywhere in the body, the best chance is to catch in urine or stools as it exits.

With respect,
Charles1952

Funny I have none in my urine but when I pee on weeds they die anyway.

Okay, Glyphosate is something I am extremely familiar with being off a farm.

The fact that it is making it's way into urine samples of people in the city should be alarming, no matter what strength it is in.

When Roundup (the original Glyphosate product I believe) was released onto the NZ market, we were told it was the best and safest weed killer ever. Why? Because it is supposed to become inert within 24 hours of the chemical meeting the soil - or so Monsanto told us when it came out.

A close reading of the literature suggests the manufacturer’s assumptions that
glyphosate is “completely safe for the environment” is an overstatement. For
instance, on January 10, 1997, after receiving complaints from the New York
Attorney General’s Office, Monsanto agreed to remove its advertisements
portraying the herbicide as “environmentally friendly” and “biodegradable”.
The Attorney General’s Office disapproved of the advertisements on grounds that
they inaccurately implied that Roundup® is as safe as the active ingredient,
glyphosate. As the Attorney General pointed out, the product contains ingredients with toxicity greater than glyphosate alone.
Glyphosate is very stable in the environment. The chemical binds to many soil
types and clay materials, making it immobile in many soils. Because
glyphosate binds so tightly to soils, it can move into groundwater when the soil
particles are washed into streams or rivers. Its binding to soil particles is also
responsible for inhibiting soil microorganisms. High levels of glyphosate are
known to inhibit soil respiration after ten weeks of chronic exposure.
Glyphosate has been detected in run-off four months after application and in
stream sediment 19 months after application. Although molecules of
glyphosate tightly bond to organic matter and sandy soils, glyphosate can
remain active in the environment.

Clearly we were lied to by Monsanto and this stuff is building up in our soils.

Here is an interesting fact sheet on Glyphosate environmentalcommons.org...

Originally posted by Philippines
So why is glyphosate, the active ingredient in Monsanto's Roundup, being found in the urine of these Europeans, who supposedly live in a place free of transgenic GMOs?

Roundup isn't exclusively used on GMO crops. They just make the GMO crops resistant to it so they can be saturated with it to make the job of targetting weeks easier without killing the crops.

It is obviously getting into normal crops through either overspray landing on them, or being absorbed through the roots out of the ground.

ETA: I remember years ago a farmer here used DDT on his land and wiped out a few crops several kilometres away.

Originally posted by NuclearPaul

Originally posted by Philippines
So why is glyphosate, the active ingredient in Monsanto's Roundup, being found in the urine of these Europeans, who supposedly live in a place free of transgenic GMOs?

It is obviously getting into normal crops through either overspray landing on them, or being absorbed through the roots out of the ground.

ETA: I remember years ago a farmer here used DDT on his land and wiped out a few crops several kilometres away.

edit on 16/6/13 by NuclearPaul because: (no reason given)

Roundup and generic glyphosate products are for sale on the shelves of stores like Kmart and Big W as well as Coles, Woolworths etc etc. This stuff is available literally everywhere - it is pretty much the universal weedkiller on the market at the moment.

On our farm we used to spray out the grass about 3 days before cultivation to kill all the grass and weeds before we planted maize (non GMO)

reply to post by markosity1973

Dear markosity1973,

Forgive my confusion, but the tests seem to indicate that it should be found in the body's waste products and just about nowhere else. Apparently, whatever enters the system is, for the most part, excreted without effect.

Or are you primarily concerned with the surfactants? That may be a slightly different issue.

As far as the New York Attorney General goes, he didn't ask them, apparently, to remove or change the product, just the labelling.

And, as your fact sheet explained:

Upon receipt of the second rat chronic/ carcinogenicity study, all findings were referred to the Health Effects Division Carcinogenicity Peer Review Committee. In 1991, the Peer Review Committee classified glyphosate as Group E (evidence of non-carcinogenicity) based on a lack of convincing evidence.

Isn't that about as clean a bill of health as a product can get?

Originally posted by charles1952
reply to post by markosity1973

 

Dear markosity1973,

Forgive my confusion, but the tests seem to indicate that it should be found in the body's waste products and just about nowhere else. Apparently, whatever enters the system is, for the most part, excreted without effect.

Or are you primarily concerned with the surfactants? That may be a slightly different issue.

As far as the New York Attorney General goes, he didn't ask them, apparently, to remove or change the product, just the labelling.

And, as your fact sheet explained:

Upon receipt of the second rat chronic/ carcinogenicity study, all findings were referred to the Health Effects Division Carcinogenicity Peer Review Committee. In 1991, the Peer Review Committee classified glyphosate as Group E (evidence of non-carcinogenicity) based on a lack of convincing evidence.

Isn't that about as clean a bill of health as a product can get?

Hi Charles,

From what we were told (by the farming industry leaders like the Ruakura farming research folk) is that it would not enter the human body at all because is supposed to degrade when it hits the soil. It's such a shame I have moved countries - I have printed fact sheets back in the woolshed back home that I could scan and upload to back what I am saying up.

*Double edit* I found the fact sheet I was talking about online!

www.nufarm.co.nz...

Read the general information paragraph 2 - it still claims that it is inactivated when it meets the soil. *

*Edit* It is only sprayed on plants weeds to kill them - it's what we call a non selective herbicide i.e it kills everything you spray it on. Therefore it should not be present in food we are eating because you would be totally insane to spray it on / near food crops - you spray it to kill the weeds before you plant a crop. I have seen the effects of Glyphosate spray drift on tomato crops - it completely wiped them out. *

It may not cause cancer, but who says it does not cause other health problems? This stuff is meant to kill plants and it does so with great efficiency.

245T, paraquat and a number of other sprays we used to use were also supposedly safe, until people starting getting sick.

reply to post by Philippines

How long before ther FDA and EPA tell us that its not harmful.

Soon they'll tell us that Round Up is good for us!

Originally posted by gladtobehere
reply to post by Philippines

 

How long before ther FDA and EPA tell us that its not harmful.

Soon they'll tell us that Round Up is good for us!

Well figuring that the Deputy Commissioner for Foods at the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is Michael Taylor, former Monsanto VP for Public Policy, and former legal council for the same company, it may be awhile before anything changes.

I don't think the EPA is free of former monsanto employees either. I think it's a revolving door of former monsanto employees being employed in critical positions in government.


en.wikipedia.org...

reply to post by NuclearPaul

ETA: I remember years ago a farmer here used DDT on his land and wiped out a few crops several kilometres away.

Just asking...how does a pesticide eliminate plants?

In Czech Rep. (and I believe elsewhere also) it is common practice to spray (non-RR) grain with glyphosate on field few days before harvest. Especially if grain is not completely mature and weather forecast is bad. That is because plants sprayed dry up rapidly.
Second possible way how glyphosate may enter Europeans food chain is via vegetable oils - as I know it is only GM product, which is allowed for human consumption here. Probably needless to say I do not buy it.
IMHO it is pretty barbaric technique but farmers argue that glyphosate based herbicides are totally safe.
While glyphosate show relatively low direct short term toxicity, these herbicides contains other chemicals (basically adjuvants) which are more toxic. Such mixtures probably work in synergy, but yet we know almost nothing about its combined effect. What is real and proven trouble with glyphosate is its toxicity to some bacteria and yeasts (because the way it works).
1. It kills some microorganisms in soil which are living in symbiosis with plants which use them as intake way of micronutrients. Plants raised on field sprayed with glyphosate have lower nutritional value.
2. It kills some microorganisms in gut. See below.
I strongly recommend this interview with one MIT researcher. It is quite long but real eye opener. The glyphosate problem is probably much more serious then I expected. You will also find other research papers on this topic from the content.

Originally posted by totallackey
reply to post by NuclearPaul

 

ETA: I remember years ago a farmer here used DDT on his land and wiped out a few crops several kilometres away.

Just asking...how does a pesticide eliminate plants?

edit on 16-6-2013 by totallackey because: clarity

Herbicides, fungicides, insecticides and rodenticides are pesticides. Just to clear terms used.

reply to post by JanAmosComenius


Sorry, but DDT does not act as a herbicide...that was the point of my question. If you want to try and clear this up, then have it...In the very broadest sense of semantics, I understand your reply.