
Emails Show FDA Chemists Have Been Finding Glyphosate in Food - clumsysmurf
https://modernfarmer.com/2018/05/emails-show-fda-chemists-have-been-quietly-finding-glyphosate-in-food/
======
TaylorAlexander
From the article:

“All of the official samples passed the test and were within the legal limits
of glyphosate residue. But those off-the-record, unofficial samples, though
done with the same equipment and tested by the same chemists, showed
glyphosate.

That’s right. The chemists found glyphosate residue on just about everything:
crackers, granola, cornmeal, honey, oatmeal, baby food, and even corn. Their
surreptitious corn test—one of the four items the FDA is actually
testing—found glyphosate significantly over the legal limit set by the EPA.
The chemists emailed their bosses to ask what to do. The FDA’s response (which
was also captured in the FOIA documents): That corn was not an “official
sample” and will thus be ignored.”

I remember watching a lecture from Vandana Shiva who claimed that glyphosate
was harmful and making it in to our food. She cited some European studies that
found glyphosate in a wide variety of products. She claimed that there were
shady things going on in the US government that seemed to obscure these facts.
At the time, I saw people writing her off as a nut, or claiming that her
masters degree in physics and PhD in philosophy meant that she didn’t have the
expertise to evaluate the biological effects of glyphosate.

And yet, I feel as though this article, if the claims are verified, does seem
to back up her claims that glyphosate is more prevalent than our government
would like to admit, and that there could really be official cover ups going
on.

I’d really like to know what’s in our food.

~~~
zasz
I'm no fan of toxic chemicals in our food and I don't trust the government or
corporations to do enough to protect it, but it seems fair to me to say that a
PhD in philosophy and a master's in physics are not particularly relevant to
claiming expertise in evaluating toxicological claims.

~~~
jMyles
A high school dropout can be a source of expertise if she commits herself to
learning the subject material and understanding the context of the claims she
is making.

When someone with a PhD in philosophy is per se blacklisted regarding other
matters of worldly concern, credentialism has gone too far.

~~~
cookiecaper
Yes. In fact, from a slightly different perspective, one can easily argue that
this very credentialism is a component of the control apparatus exploited by
the "vested interests".

To become credentialed in a field, you must spend multiple years repeating the
same things over and over, getting programmed to perceive and approach
problems in compliance with the field's orthodoxy.

There is a small core of people who decide whether you will gain your
credential or not. These persons generally have interests besides just "train
the best new $OUR_FIELDers out there", if only because that's subjective and
will take many years to play out. They're generally looking for funding,
projects, publications, appointments, etc. In charge of _those_ people is
university administration, and their conflict of interest is so obvious and
inherent that it's a waste of time to type it out.

So you have this big powerful apparatus that has many little gullets that can
be made to respond much more favorably by pouring a little money here, a
little prestige there, etc. Many of these "gullets" will balk if this is done
openly, but if you add a thin layer of abstraction and ambiguity, very few
people will even notice the relationship, let alone care. It really only takes
a minimal amount of obfuscation to get people to jump on board with something
that has direct personal benefit to offer.

As such, the perspective of intelligent outsiders who haven't gone through an
elaborate niche-specific brainwashing process should be _valued_ , not
dismissed.

------
exp1orer
So this suggests that the samples submitted to the FDA for testing were not
representative of ordinary food.

This reminds me of the ongoing Tetra Tech/Hunter's Point scandal [1], where
the US Navy paid $300M to a contractor to clean up a development site. The
contractor was required to submit samples from the site to prove they had
cleaned it up. Instead, they just pulled soil from known clean places and
submitted for testing.

How much of the ongoing monitoring activity that our government does relies on
good faith from companies? Is this the tip of the iceberg, or do the fact that
these cases get caught prove that the meta-monitoring is working well?

How can we improve this state of affairs?

[1] [https://sf.curbed.com/2018/1/26/16916742/hunters-point-
shipy...](https://sf.curbed.com/2018/1/26/16916742/hunters-point-shipyard-
toxic-cleanup)

~~~
swiley
I helped get a device through part15 testing during an internship and was
shocked to find that you don’t need the same firmware (like at all. You can
run totally different oses and everything, they don’t have to share a single
line of code.) As long as you say “this is pretty much the same as what we’re
shipping to users” you’re fine. They don’t really have anyway to double check
it and to be honest I wouldn’t be totally surprised if a lot of devices used
different power levels and generally behaved differently in the field just by
mistake.

After doing that, when ever I hear about things being “tested” to standards
from some arm of a government I instinctively think of that. I don’t know how
you could practically improve on it either.

~~~
joenathanone
Random sample testing after the product ships with large fines for violators.

~~~
conception
Jail time for CEOs and board members of violators.

------
torgoguys
Here is the money quote that these articles seem to be based off of. From an
email detailing progress on developing testing methods:

>"I spiked a batch of broccoli at 0.002 ug/g and could detect the glyphosate
pretty well but I did need to manually integrate some of the peaks. I used
broccoli because it’s the only thing I have on hand that does not have
glyphosate in it. I have brought wheat crackers, granola cereal, and corn meal
from home and there’s a fair amount in all of them.”

There is another email talking about the one corn sample being 6.5ppm, above
the 5.0 threshold, also in the context of testing methods.

So the corn sample could be an issue, but the headlines about it being
everywhere, in implied high concentrations, seems premature unless I missed
something in these emails. The tester used the broccoli because it had none
and he could test detection down to 0.002 ppm, FAR below the 5.0 threshold.
When he says there was a fair amount in everything else he had, we still don't
know what that means. Was it .02ppm, .2ppm, 2.0ppm or what? The tone of the
email and it's reply (not quoted above) doesn't suggest worry about a high
rate to me.

------
Bud
I hate articles like this. Zero useful data. Zero useful sources. And zero
information about the _levels_ of glyphosate which were found.

~~~
dandare
This is part of the reason why people believe in conspiracy theories. This
issue should be absolutely clear - either there is a harmful level of
pesticides in our food or not. Any ambiguity should be investigated by the
police as a public endangerment crime. There should be zero room four doubt in
cases like this.

~~~
ItsMe000001
> either there is a harmful level of pesticides in our food or not

That is an impossible standard even if we had far better methods. One,
"damage" is a continuum. Two, who is affected is a wide range. Three, we only
test chemicals individually, and set threshold levels individually, but in
reality mixing chemicals very often leads to vastly different effects. For
example, when lead and mercury were tested together (LD testing) it was found
toxicity increased a thousandfold compared to each one alone. But there is no
way to test a meaningful number of combinations, and that would still leave
out what happens in the extremely complex biochemical environment of a human
body in any case.

For the foreseeable future, maybe forever even in 10,000 years of solid
scientific progress (because complex stuff remains complex), will be be able
to do more than do guesstimates - and they will all be on a population level,
don't even try to say anything definite about an individual.

That means calling for "solid proof of damage" before anything gets banned is
a sure way to stall any action almost indefinitely. I recommend a look at the
history of lead (which has not yet ended at all). The most "solid proof" I can
think of is a large scale and long-term human experiment, unthinkable. Even
then you could raise doubts about the context/environment, methods, selected
participants, etc. "Solid proof" is a lot less solid than a lot of people
think, the text book examples of easy primitive physics experiments make it
seem as if it's easy to find out things "for certain".

------
aembleton
Many farmers routinely use Roundup and other herbicides to clear their fields
of weeds before crops emerge in the spring. But what's more alarming is
they’re also using glyphosate on crops shortly before they are harvested, in
order to desiccate (dry out) the plants and make them easier to harvest.

Glyphosate kills parts of the crop that haven’t ripened evenly, and dries the
crop. This allows Combine harvesters to move more quickly and cover more
ground during harvest, and may reduce drying costs. But applying glyphosate so
close to harvest makes the likelihood of finding residues in food even higher.

From [https://www.soilassociation.org/our-campaigns/not-in-our-
bre...](https://www.soilassociation.org/our-campaigns/not-in-our-bread/what-
is-glyphosate/)

------
TangoTrotFox
Some interesting factoids here.

\- The US legal limit of glyphosate are vastly higher than the EU, ranging up
to 10000% in some cases (cattle). (EU) [1] (US) [2]

\- Glyphosate has been declared a probably carcinogen by the World Health
Organization.

\- Monsanto is the developer of glyphosate. The former head of the FDA,
appointed by the last administration to a newly created position tongue in
cheek referred to as 'The Czar of Foods', officially "Deputy Commissioner of
Foods the FDA", was Michael Taylor. [3]. Michael Taylor was a Monsanto VP
whose career was in large part started by legally arguing that companies ought
be allowed to knowingly allow at least some percent of carcinogens into
processed foods.

\- US regulatory agencies test thousands of products for hundreds of different
chemical residues. Even though glyphosate is, by far, the most widely used
chemical herbicide, it was never tested for until after the WHO declared it a
probable carcinogen and private tests showed extremely high levels of
glyphosate even in products where it should not be present in, such as honey.
[4].

\- Regulatory capture sucks.

[1] - [http://ec.europa.eu/food/plant/pesticides/eu-pesticides-
data...](http://ec.europa.eu/food/plant/pesticides/eu-pesticides-
database/public/?event=pesticide.residue.CurrentMRL&language=EN)

[2] - [https://www.ecfr.gov/cgi-
bin/retrieveECFR?gp=1&ty=HTML&h=L&m...](https://www.ecfr.gov/cgi-
bin/retrieveECFR?gp=1&ty=HTML&h=L&mc=true&r=SECTION&n=se40.26.180_1364)

[3] -
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_R._Taylor](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_R._Taylor)

[4] - [https://www.huffingtonpost.com/carey-gillam/fda-suspends-
gly...](https://www.huffingtonpost.com/carey-gillam/fda-suspends-glyphosate-
r_b_12913458.html) (I am reluctant to link to a Huffington Post article, but
this is far above their normal standards of quality, and provides a clear and
factual overview. Searching for 'US glyphosate testing' turns up countless
other sources if one would prefer not rely on Huffington.)

------
acidburnNSA
Measurement techniques are getting better and better and we'll find more and
more articles finding x in y. I have not analyzed this case but did just
finish reading a highly relevant piece on measures of toxicity that included
glyphosate. Highly recommended for your mental models.

[https://thoughtscapism.com/2018/05/07/measures-of-
toxicity/](https://thoughtscapism.com/2018/05/07/measures-of-toxicity/)

~~~
pmoriarty
That's a very interesting and informative article. However, after reading it I
came away more confused than I was before -- especially when looking at their
"Acute toxicity" and "Chronic toxicity" tables.

According to the acute toxicity tables, caffeine is only slightly more toxic
than lead, and Vitamin D3 is 5 more times toxic.

According to the chronic toxicity tables, both caffeine and Vitamin D3 are
about 3 times more toxic than lead.

The dangers of lead exposure are widely appreciated, so I suppose the main
difference must be that lead accumulates in body tissue while caffeine and D3
don't, and that's what makes lead so much more dangerous?

I wish there were some more tables that showed us the more relevant dangers of
these substances, with issues such as accumulation in body tissue, route of
administration, and other relevant factors taken in to account.

~~~
macawfish
Don't forget that lead is quite a dense material.

~~~
ianai
Lead also never leaves your system - caffeine does.

------
RcouF1uZ4gsC
>Shortly thereafter, a string of studies and reviews indicated that glyphosate
should probably be further studied, and in March of 2015, the cancer research
arm of the World Health Organization declared glyphosate a “probable
carcinogen.”

That is outdated. In 2016, the Joint WHO/FAO "Meeting concluded that
glyphosate is unlikely to pose a carcinogenic risk to humans from exposure
through the diet."

[http://www.who.int/foodsafety/jmprsummary2016.pdf?ua=1](http://www.who.int/foodsafety/jmprsummary2016.pdf?ua=1)

~~~
aguyaguy
That is also outdated. Turns out, glyphosate by itself is not as carcinogenic
as Roundup, the actual product used. The chemicals used with glyphosate, like
POEA, make it more harmful.

~~~
everybodyknows
Is POEA chemically stable -- or is it likely to break down before the food is
eventually consumed?

------
ggm
I'd like somebody in the space to explain why the FDA samples are more
representative of the overall food supply than the random samples from food
stores. There may be a good reason. There may be reasons why in some
locations, food has higher traces than the FDA sees. How about (for instance)
if its imported? Not that its good, but it would help _explain_

I rather think that even though the FDA samples test ok, There is a moment
where _somebody_ should be regularly testing product the other side of the
supply chain, for residues of pesticides and other things, and if we find
them, it should be actionable if they exceed some threshold.

So.. given these people found traces in the over-the-counter food chain, is
nobody now legally obligated to do .. anything?

~~~
kaycebasques
I think the article is implying that the “official” samples were probably
supplied by people who are colluding with Monsanto.

Well, it’s not fair of me to say that the article is implying that... it’s
not. But that’s the conclusion I drew.

~~~
ggm
Sure. It's the conclusion I'm tempted to draw too. But I'm trying to avoid
walking into the grand conspiracy, too soon. I think the influence of Monsanto
and others on the actions of the FDA are way out of whack, but there are many
moments of innocent misunderstanding in this kind of report. I think it's most
likely the classic incompetence/malice thing, or a misunderstanding of some
kind. Like, FDA testing US farm produce, the shops selling unlabelled,
imported, 'US origin' but actually sourced from somewhere else, and re-
bagged...

~~~
kaycebasques
Fair enough, thanks for being healthily skeptical

------
Avshalom
As a note: the throwing out of samples might not necessarily be sinister (on
the FDA's end) so much as a result of the FDA's general hamstrungedness.

[https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/02/02/bug-
system](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/02/02/bug-system)

Key quote in there is that before the FDA is even allowed to ask for a recall
they have to prove a DNA match between whatever caused food poisoning and the
specific bag of whatever.

If the FDA has extremely rigid chain of custody rules for what samples/test
they're allowed to talk about in public and you had a billion dollars riding
in them only reporting the best samples it might not be that hard to fuck with
that chain of custody and disqualify anything you knew about.

------
fncypants
I've noticed that Monsanto appears to be on an astroturfing campaign. Half of
the ads appearing in my Reddit front page are promoted posts that are pro-
glyphosate. They point to legitimate news articles, for example, that report
on a study finding that glyphosate is not a carginogen. Of course, these
studies contradict other studies that glyphosate is a carcinogen or otherwise
a concern.

In truth, I was ready to believe the pro-glypsophate studies until a contrary
consensus formed. Because of this astroturfing campaign, I now have doubts.

~~~
tptacek
There are no credible studies indicating that glyphosate is a carcinogen, and
it would be a little bit surprising it if was, since it targets a metabolic
pathway not present in animals. Meanwhile, many of the herbicides that
glyphosate displace, plenty of which remain in use, are known human
carcinogens.

The most widely reported declaration of glyphosate's carcinogenicity, by IARC,
was disavowed by the WHO, IARC's parent organization.

~~~
philipkglass
Yes, I agree that evidence to date does not show glyphosate is a carcinogen.
But this:

 _There are no credible studies indicating that glyphosate is a carcinogen,
and it would be a little bit surprising it if was, since it targets a
metabolic pathway not present in animals._

is not a very strong argument. Harmful "off-target effects" are a very common
cause of drug development program failures. Most chemicals that are probable
human carcinogens weren't developed with the intention to target metabolic
pathways in _any_ living thing.

~~~
tptacek
The evidence seems to suggest that glyphosate is basically inert in humans,
doesn't it?

~~~
philipkglass
I've read enough literature about the carcinogenicity to assure myself that it
is very probably not a carcinogen. And to my chemist's eye it looks fast to
degrade, pretty benign overall. But biology is surprisingly complicated.
That's why I think that the " _it targets_ " argument means little. That's the
only part I took issue with.

------
notjtrig
What I think people are missing is the relationship between GMO and
Glyphosate. The first round of GMO seed available in America was Monsanto's
'RoundUp Ready' brand engineered to be sprayed with a unholey amount of
RoundUp. In 2014 83% of GMO crop planted was modified to be resistant to
herbisides, mostly RoundUp.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_genetically_modified...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_genetically_modified_crops)

------
TwoBit
It seems to me that any sufficiently equipped lab can run these tests. How
about Consumer Reports? Well Consumer Reports sucks these days so maybe
somebody else...

~~~
vertexFarm
That's a really good point. Are there independent tests corroborating this? If
so, why hasn't the alarm been sounded before now? Or was it and nobody paid
attention after the next news cycle?

------
hamparawa
Although not scientifically proven(?), it is believed that the chronic kidney
disease (CKD) is caused by Glyphosate. CKD is largely present in North
Central, North Western, Uva and Eastern Provinces in Sri Lanka.

[https://www.news.lk/news/political-current-
affairs/item/8198...](https://www.news.lk/news/political-current-
affairs/item/8198-govt-issues-gazette-notification-banning-glyphosate)

~~~
Deestan
It is also believed that the world is flat, and that magic crystals will
protect your computer from viruses.

------
bickfordb
I would prefer to eat most weeds than glyphosate.

Also, what do this imply politically? Testing for Round-Up in our food supply
is now a states rights issue?

~~~
hetman
That's not how it works. Weeds don't somehow get into grains when they're
collected. What they do is reduce yields of the crops we're actually
interested in collecting. Lower yields for the same farming effort means
higher prices. So what ultimately happens when the consumer sees two identical
loaves of bread on the supermarket shelf and one is $2.50 while the other is
$3.50?

~~~
gowld
The cost of grain input is essentially 0 (as a fraction of finished product
sticker price). The cost is in baking and transportation. Corn is the cheapest
product in USA.

~~~
mustacheemperor
Agriculture has a relatively fixed supply and demand every cycle because of
nature and basic human needs. It's not a matter of defects affecting the
bottom line, it's a reduction of invaluable output. Because natural forces
flex and largely define the output for a given season, anything that can
increase it is critical. Efficient agriculture technology is the only reason
the world didn't collapse a la Malthus.

The best concept to replace chemicals in food production that I've seen is the
use of UAVs or other robots to mechanically remove weeds and pests. Those
tasks were done by humans for a long time, but we switched to chemical
alternatives because human labor isn't practical for the scale of food
production humanity demands.

------
brookhaven_dude
And Dr Oz panned for railing against GMO and favoring organic food...

And to the commenters saying "there is no evidence that GMO foods are harmful"
or "non-USDA organic food is causing harm", you have to wonder at where does
the burden of proof really lie in case of things that I am ingesting?

~~~
Truestuff
The thing about science is that it's fairly easy to prove something is
harmful. It's darn near impossible to prove something is safe. Organic food
isn't 100% safe, and is more likely than conventional to be contaminated with
pathogens such as e coli. But after 25 years of use with no proof otherwise,
I'd say GMOs have met the burden of proof.

------
sebleon
Whether you believe glysophate is carcinogenic or not, this scandal
demonstrates how the FDA works for industry, not the people.

If they had the taxpayers best interests at heart, they would not be
concealing or halting research around a widespread potential carcinogen in our
food supply.

------
pmoriarty
This reminds me of all the news reports of tests showing arsenic presence in
rice (often due to rice being grown on soil where arsenic had been used as a
pesticide for non-food crops such as cotton in the past).

But what (if any) health effects did the detected amounts of arsenic in rice
have? How how much arsenic in rice would be safe? The FDA investigated these
questions and finally came out with a report: [1][2]

Among their findings:

 _" In the general population, limiting levels of inorganic arsenic to 200 ppb
or higher would not change the cancer risk significantly. Setting a limit
below 200 ppb of inorganic arsenic in rice and rice products would decrease
the risk. Setting a limit of 150 ppb of inorganic arsenic in rice and rice
products would decrease the risk between 0% and 23%. The risk reduction is
between 2% and 47% at a limit of 100 ppb of inorganic arsenic in rice and rice
products. Finally setting a limit at 75 ppb of inorganic arsenic in rice and
rice products would decrease the risk between 17% and 79%. The percentage of
risk reduction is dependent on the product (see Table 5.6)."_

 _" Setting a maximum level for inorganic arsenic in rice and rice products
could affect availability in the U.S. market. For example, were we to set a
maximum level of 100 ppb in these foods, the availability in the marketplace
might decrease by 4% to 93%, depending on the type of rice."_

 _" In the general population, the cancer risk would decrease in proportion to
decreases in serving size and frequency of consumption of rice and rice
products. Conversely, the risk would double over a lifetime if the consumption
frequency were increased from 1 serving per day to 2 servings per day during
that entire period (see Table 5.9)."_

 _" Eliminating rice and rice products from the diets of infants and of
children up to 6 years old could reduce the lifetime cancer risk from
inorganic arsenic in rice and rice products by 6% and 23%, respectively. In
other words, the risk model predicts that an infant not fed any rice or rice
products has an approximately 6% lower chance of developing lung or bladder
cancer from arsenic contamination of these foods, over the lifetime, compared
with an infant who is fed these products (see Table 5.7)."_

Based on their research, the FDA proposed a limit of 100 parts per billion for
inorganic arsenic in infant rice cereal.[3] Unfortunately, they did not
propose any limits on arsenic in rice or rice products apart from infant rice
cereal, so how much rice is safe to eat is still an open question.

Still, their research and report are quite helpful in understanding the risk
of arsenic exposure in rice, so consumers can now make informed decisions in
regards to their own rice consumption. I hope the FDA will do something like
that for glyphosate in food.

Also, such research and limits are prime examples of good work done by a
government agency to keep us all healthy in the face of a food industry and
"free market" which are clearly not able or willing to effectively regulate
themselves.

[1] -
[https://www.fda.gov/Food/FoodborneIllnessContaminants/Metals...](https://www.fda.gov/Food/FoodborneIllnessContaminants/Metals/ucm319870.htm)

[2] -
[https://www.fda.gov/Food/FoodScienceResearch/RiskSafetyAsses...](https://www.fda.gov/Food/FoodScienceResearch/RiskSafetyAssessment/ucm485278.htm)

[3] -
[https://www.fda.gov/NewsEvents/Newsroom/PressAnnouncements/u...](https://www.fda.gov/NewsEvents/Newsroom/PressAnnouncements/ucm493740.htm)

~~~
freetime2
> Still, their research and report are quite helpful in understanding the risk
> of arsenic exposure in rice, so consumers can now make informed decisions in
> regards to their own rice consumption. I hope the FDA will do something like
> that for glyphosate in food.

My cynical side thinks that is far too nuanced a finding for consumers to be
able to make informed decision. People tend to like black and white answers
like "no carbs", "no gluten", or my personal favorite "no chemicals".

------
shbm
What food products do FDA chemists consume from the market is a question that
would give us a lot of insight.

------
ausjke
Not surprised, what goes around comes around, sigh. This might change
evolution gradually, in a bad sense.

------
geggam
When the FDA and Monsanto have a revolving door of executives why is anyone
surprised at this ?

------
ljk
how could someone run these tests at home? does it require expensive
equipment?

~~~
sndean
I'm not aware of cheaper assays that may have been developed. So, yeah, it'd
likely require buying a GC-MS (>$50,000), plus a gas source, whatever MS
software, and some training.

Alternatively, for ~$50 there are many core facilities at universities and
elsewhere that'll happily run whatever sample you send them and email you back
the results.

------
sabujp
serious question so why doesn't everyone have cancer?

~~~
whatshisface
A radioactive source could be distributed to the pockets of every living
person, and while tons of people would get cancer there would still be some
people who didn't. Carcinogens raise your _risk_ of cancer.

------
himom
Another reason to go organic.

~~~
adrr
Organic pesticides are nasty stuff as well.

"In 2010, a study was published detailing the progression of Parkinson's-like
symptoms in mice following chronic intragastric ingestion of low doses of
rotenone. The concentrations in the central nervous system were below
detectable limits, yet still induced PD pathology.[31]

In 2011, a US National Institutes of Health study showed a link between
rotenone use and Parkinson's disease in farm workers."

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotenone](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotenone)

~~~
alexandercrohde
Rotenone is no longer an organic pesticide.

[Even in America. It can only be used as a "fishkill"]

source: [http://npic.orst.edu/NPRO/#](http://npic.orst.edu/NPRO/#)

~~~
gowld
What does "organic" mean if a specific substance can become "not organic"
without changing?

~~~
oasisbob
You have a point. I think "not organic" in this context is shorthand for "not
allowed in organic agriculture." Scanning the reg, the USDA's list is titled
"Prohibited Natural Substances."

------
heston88
Just another form of eugenics

------
kokey
I bet you they also detect dihydrogen monoxide at near lethal dose levels in
food samples, due to farmers spraying it on the crops. Some of that stuff even
makes it into the rivers and flows into the ocean and can be detected in the
fish in the sea.

~~~
dandare
HN is not Reddit.

~~~
kokey
Sorry, the point I was trying to make, immaturely, is that detecting
contamination with potentially toxic substances doesn't necessarily mean it's
dangerous. There's a lot of variables at play here and sometimes it spreading
widely could mean it's because it's actually harmless or could even be
necessary.

With regards to glyphosate we have data of people who attempted to commit
suicide by drinking quantities large enough to spray on 4000 sqft of cropland,
or multiple times more of that.

