Globally-used herbicide contains cancerous chemicals

Common ways to avoid cancer are eating a healthy diet, exercising regularly and avoiding smoking. But even if you live a healthy lifestyle and have genetics without a strain of cancer in your family tree it is still possible to be susceptible to cancer due to reasons beyond your control. Chemicals and preservatives that are commonly found in 80% of our foods and home products are rapidly becoming the cause for infertility and melanoma amongst various other cancers. Since the 1950's, production of additives have been used to create longer use out of products, a longer shelf life and in most cases to cut costs of production.

And in breaking news, The California Environmental Protection Agency announced that it plans to label glyphosate — the most commonly used herbicide and main ingredient in Monsanto’s Roundup — as a chemical “known to cause cancer.” Glyphosate is a systemic herbicide, discovered by chemist John Franz in the 70's that is used to kill weeds and pesky grasses known to compete with commercial crops grown around the globe. Unfortunately this ingredient has now been discovered to be cancerous.

Monsanto’s seed products sprayed with Glyphosate-containing RoundUp dominate the global market for genetically engineered crops to the extent of 80 percent of the GM corn market and 93 percent of the GM soy market.

This means that the foods in your household, bought from your grocery store and eaten regularly by you and your family are grown by Monsanto’s seeds and sprayed on the regular with the Roundup product that is now known to be cancerous.

The medical impacts that could result from a small amount of long-term exposure to Roundup could lead to kidney and liver problems. The World Health Organization’s research arm also recently found that the chemical is carcinogenic to humans. The unfortunate side is that Monsanto has been a company since the 1970's accounting for over 45 years in the food supply that have exposed consumers for this long.

While environmental activists celebrated the debut of this information that is another shove at the Monsanto franchise, the EPA will allow the public to provide written commentary until October 5, 2015 on the proposition 65. Under the proposition businesses are required to provide a “clear and reasonable” warning before exposing consumers to cancerous products. The warning could be labels on a product, workplace postings, distributed notices at apartment buildings, or a notice published in a newspaper, however, the listing does not lead to a restriction or ban on sales of the product.

For more information on proposition 65, the California government posted this notice for the public. For written comment, contact in e-mail form P65Public.Comments@oehha.ca.gov, with “NOIL” in the subject line for consideration of your stance on the topic and listed below is the appropriate mailing address:

Ms. Esther Barajas-Ochoa

Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment P.O. Box 4010, MS-19B Sacramento, California 95812-4010 Fax: (916) 323-2265

Street Address: 1001 I Street Sacramento, California 95814